This week, we thought it would be useful to spread some of the joy regarding the development of the new PMI Portfolio Management Professional certification (PfMP), which will add a portfolio level to the PMI’s suite of qualifications.
“What is portfolio management?” I hear you say. Well, the official definition from the PMI is “a component collection of programs, projects or operations managed as a group to achieve strategic objectives.” The APMG define it as “the totality of an organisation’s investments (or segment thereof) in the changes required to achieve its strategic objectives.” Basically, making sure you are doing as much of the right stuff as you can – and demonstrating that you are doing it.
To put it in simpler terms, consider a car. You have a nice bright shiny new car. It is of no use to you unless you have the skills to drive it…that is your project management layer – or the ability to maintain it or have it maintained…the operations layer. That enables you to get from A to B.
But what is B? Where are you going? If you are taking three kids to school, it is no good having a sports car. If you are moving furniture around, it’s no good having a little four seat saloon car. So the vehicle is programme management layer – it’s no good being a really good driver (the project management layer) with really good skills as a car mechanic (the operations layer) if you don’t know where you’re going.
The final part of the picture is how you are going to get there – if you like, the SatNav bit. How can you most efficiently get to where you are going without sitting in traffic for hours on end, or running out of petrol. Conceptually – the world of portfolio management! It’s all about saving money, getting more value out of what you are doing – more bang for your buck. If you consider programme management as “doing the thing right”… portfolio management is doing the right thing.
So the PMI is in the final stages of producing a certification to demonstrate someone’s ability and experience at the portfolio layer. What’s the point? Well, portfolio management is being adopted more and more – across industries and across the globe. So, there is a corresponding demand for more knowledge, resources and professional recognition. The PfMP credential is intended to validate and demonstrate a practitioner’s knowledge and experience. It will also differentiate practitioners from their non-credentialed peers, and, because it is transferable among methodologies and industries, it helps make them more marketable. It will complement existing qualifications such as the MoP and provide the first globally-accepted credential for the role of a portfolio manager.
We’ve written before about PfMP, including a useful set of FAQs about how to attain the certification.
WINCHESTER (23rd June 2014) – As providers of leading project, programme and portfolio management (P3M) training worldwide under the UK Cabinet Office Best Practice standards, p3m global today welcomes the news that AXELOS have removed the Foundation Only pre-requisite for takers of the PRINCE2 Practitioner examination.
AXELOS Global Best Practice announced last Thursday that from 1st July 2014, they would waive their “requirement for project managers seeking the PRINCE2 Practitioner qualification to obtain the Foundation level first.”
p3m global particularly applauds this update for its active inclusiveness of other leading project management standards of top practice. These include the Project Management Institute and the US and UK chapters of the International Project Management Association (IPMA) – the American Society for the Advancement of Project Management and the Association for Project Management, respectively. As recognised ATOs for both PMI and AXELOS (through APMG-International) certifications – and with aspirations for similar ATO status within IPMA via the APM – this is a significant development.
“With this initiative, we hope that project managers worldwide will consider how obtaining this higher level best practice management standard can improve project management within their organizations and develop their own careers without having to revisit a more elementary level of study beforehand,” said Frances Scarff, Product Development Director at AXELOS.
Inclusion opens up new windows for expanding the AXELOS customer-base that had once been closed or viewed as filled with a requisite re-learning of competencies. PMI and APMG-International Accredited Training Organisations (ATOs) like p3m global welcome this opportunity to reach out to customers in the PMI realm.
“It’s good to see cross-standard recognition in the industry as we have long advised are clients that these two credentials are complimentary rather than conflicting,” said Ray Mead, CEO of p3m global. “I hope this will encourage some of our clients on the PMI side to look at what they can use from the AXELOS stable to further their role in project management, and vice versa.”
Dan Strayer is the Marketing Coordinator for p3m global. A native of Manchester (by way of the US), Dan currently edits all forms of p3m global Media, including this blog, the monthly newsletter (subscribe here), and all forms of social media output by p3m global that you can see in the icons below. Other recent ventures from p3m global Media include Slideshare and Prezi. Get in touch with Dan on Twitter via @p3mglobal or @danlstrayer.
