CLIENT RESULTS

The $6M Mandate

Global enterprise · Legal to IT

A CEO expects his global organization to deliver a minimum of $6M in process improvement value while delivering a higher quality employee and customer experience.

$6M

minimum value the CEO expected

Global

every function, Legal through IT

0

evidence of progress at mid-year

Untrained

project leaders, no shared method

THE SITUATION

The Director of Internal Audit was handed a global portfolio on top of a demanding day job.

Halfway through the first year of the $6M challenge, the C-level leaders had no evidence that the projects were progressing as required to meet the CEO’s benefits goal on time.

The Director of Internal Audit, who reported to the CFO, was assigned to directly manage the portfolio of projects involving every aspect of this global firm, from Legal to Information Technology, in addition to all of the responsibilities of his existing role.

Many of the project leaders, including the Director, had never been formally trained in project management. The company did not have a consistent project methodology, language, or talent development approach for subject matter experts asked to lead projects in addition to their roles.

WHAT WE DID

Practical Steps, Applied to the Real Work

01

Implemented basic portfolio management and governance best practices.

02

Trained and coached all of the project leaders assigned.

03

Created a framework to reduce the time project management tasks consume staff.

04

Delivered bite-sized, focused mini-courses on Friday afternoons over five months, built for immediate use on the job.

05

Integrated project status into the existing enterprise-wide portfolio management tool managed by the IT PMO.

WHAT WE DID

What Changed

Visibility

Rapidly provided visibility into project performance to date.

Governance

Instituted a disciplined process for C-level leaders to continuously monitor and manage the project portfolio globally.

Benefits realization

Partnered with internal Finance personnel to track benefits toward the CEO’s expected $6M ROI.

Better communication

Improved the cadence and quality of communication between leadership and project owners, so everyone kept prioritizing the right projects.

Resource focus

Created a forum for reviewing resource needs and focusing people on the highest-priority work.

Lasting talent

Expert leaders learned simple, practical project management practices they can use wherever their careers take them.

IN THEIR WORDS

What Leaders Said

Dawn’s team helped us transform a disorganized group of individual initiatives into a cohesive project portfolio. Through this process we were able to deliver significant value to the organization.

Director, Internal Audit Finance

Dawn’s team provided leadership and training with a well-disciplined methodology for project and portfolio management to non-project managers. They are very knowledgeable in this space and it was clearly demonstrated through results provided regularly to our senior executives. Once again they have performed at the highest levels of satisfaction and professionalism.

Director, Information Technology (IT) Program Management Office (PMO)

YOUR TURN