Enterprise project management (EPM) tools have become a pervasive technology in organisations over the past five years, delivering improved management of projects and project processes. Growth and technological advances in this area are now at the stage where enterprise project management is ready to move out of the project management office and become a mainstream business management tool.
The evolution of enterprise project management
"Many organisations have already realised the benefit that a centralised, server-based project management system brings to their organisation in terms of core control over project baselines and enabling project collaboration between different vertical groups," comments Pieter Erasmus, director of local South African enterprise project management specialist, Fulcrum Business Solutions.
Project management has evolved from single users supported by desktop applications to a server-client-based relationship in which true enterprise-level projects can be managed. But with any strategic project comes the need to make decision and reliable decision support is a critical success factor in EPM.
EPM tools have proven their ability to provide significant benefit at an operational level and many case studies have shown significant improvement in operational efficiencies. However, the real strategic value comes from solutions like EPM, only when they can be leveraged as part of the decision-making processes higher up in the organisation.
The paperless project management office has become a reality for organisations both large and small, giving project managers access to work methods that deliver accurate reporting through the built-in business intelligence (BI) functions of EPM.
Adding a layer of transparency with BI
But if EPM tools are going to become mainstream business management applications, then better control and availability of data for decision-making executives is key. BI provides this layer of transparency.
Managers and project executives want more from their EPM systems, they are looking to integrate project data into a BI process that allows for fact-based, consolidated reporting directly from the project system - delivering scorecards from the project repository to replace previous cumbersome essay type reports. The bottom line is that project managers need to remove existing manual processes in order to deliver more trustworthy data points.
A previous challenge with the use of project management tools was the time delays in collating data and ensuring that all team members have access to the latest data points. Many project managers would print out cumbersome project plans on a daily basis as a method of showing progress. The integration of a BI layer lets information rise up to relevant levels and be exposed in standard, formatted scorecards.
Imperative to success in this integration is the EPM system`s ability to feed the data warehouse with consistent and reliable data. Only then can the value of BI be harnessed in developing a scorecard that adds valuable and timely information to decision-makers without adding to the information deluge.
Harvey Jones Systems, the South African agent for BI software, ProClarity, agrees with Fulcrum`s case for an integrated EPM and BI solution. "A BI module, together with EPM, allows users to extract and present information in a unified way. The benefit to project managers and executives is an ability to see instantly the impact that all current projects are having on their objectives, goals and targets," adds Colleen Maguire, Product Manager at Harvey Jones Systems.
The power of the combination
Both EPM and BI are tools that are no longer restricted to the IT departments of organisations, but have taken on the mantle of business management tools. In addition, the two processes feed off each other in connecting processes and data to company strategy.
EPM and BI can be used effectively to manage the innovation levels of business - EPM allows for strategy to be implemented and BI completes the cycle through reporting and analytics feeding back into the strategy.
EPM takes overall strategy and drives these initiatives down into a project management process and into budgeting, reporting and alerting. From here the BI modules take on the role of monitoring, analytics and performance management. Finally, the process feeds back into the company strategy. In short, the EPM tool feeds the initiatives (projects) in an organisation and the scorecard measures the progress of these against business objectives.
The power of the EPM and BI combination lies in reliable data fed straight from the project repository into customised scorecards to deliver valuable information to decision-makers without having to access yet another reporting environment.
EPM systems then become strategic execution tools for business performance management.
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