#155 | PMOs Leading Change: Change Management & Organisational Agility (Live Webinar)

In this episode, we delve deep into the evolving landscape of Project Management Offices (PMOs) and the increasingly vital role of change management as we approach 2025. Today’s PMOs face the challenge of delivering projects and ensuring those projects lead to meaningful, sustainable change within organizations. With insights from industry experts, we uncover how the intersection of PMO function and change management is crucial for driving organizational success and securing a strong return on investment.

The discussion highlights the importance of PMOs and change management teams collaborating to enhance project success and delivering sustainable transformations.

In this episode, we cover:

• Understanding the shift towards change management within PMOs

• Importance of tracking benefit realization and ROI

• Elevating PMOs’ roles to incorporate change management competencies

• Collaborative frameworks for PMOs and change management practices

• Future predictions for PMOs and change management integration

• Identifying the skills needed for PMOs to drive change initiatives

• Utilizing technology and analytics for better change management

• Strategies for improving stakeholder engagement and adoption rates

And more...

Contact us if you're interested in workshops focusing on PMO and change management collaboration!

Book your discovery assessment here: https://agilemanagementoffice.com/discovery-assessment/ 

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to PMO and Change Dynamics
• 11:51 Insights from PMO and Change Perspectives
• 21:25 Elevating PMOs into Change Management
• 43:21 Q&A: Addressing Listener Questions
• 51:33 Themes from Audience Questions
• 1:10:21 Introducing Co
• 2:17:21 Expectations for PMO and Change in 2025
• 7:31:27 Integrating PMOs and Change for Better Outcomes

Transcript

Fatimah Abbouchi: 0:03

So today we're going to take you through what we expect when it comes to PMO and change, and why we expect it to mature in 2025 and why it's important. So there's a lot of definitely different insights we can share from both perspectives from a PMO expertise perspective and from the change space as well. We'll also talk about how PMOs can elevate their roles to incorporate change management and this will be really useful for those that are on the change or delivery side to how to work better with PMOs, and we'll also talk about some proven ways to adopt and drive sustainable change and ideas from both the change side and from a PMO side as well. And then we'll answer some of. We've had over 80 or I think it's nearing now closer to 100 questions that have come in. Now we won't get through them all, but we've grouped them into themes and we'll talk through those questions, some of those towards the end in a bit of a rapid fire, and other than that, I'll just quickly introduce you.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 1:05

So most of you who have been in one of these meetups before will already know me, so we won't read through this. You can have a look. You'll get a copy of this. You can find me on LinkedIn. And then I've got Matt, my special co-host, who's the founder and managing director of Mate. So hi, matt.

Matt Dragun: 1:20

Hi Fatimah, Great to be here and thank you for having us on.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 1:24

Pleasure and thanks everyone for putting into the chat where you're from. I can see there is some global visitors who I'm sure are in a very interesting time zone. So thank you, we appreciate your being here. Hey, so you did say in your questions that you submitted lots of different things, and these were just some of those that you talked about. As I said, we received lots and lots of questions and really great opportunity to go through some of those and to continue to provide additional insights post today as well. But let's get straight into it. Okay, so we've taken the chance to go through the different perspectives, as I said. So, matt, being the change management expert and also a technology expert, we're going to talk to that side, and then I'm going to cover off from a PMO perspective. So let's start. So, matt, one of the first things I think we could start with is talking about what we're expecting, seeing, what we're hearing when it comes to, like, the PMO and change space. So why don't you kick us off?

Matt Dragun: 2:29

Yeah, thanks, fatima, and the slide on screen is basically a survey of about 240 business leaders in Australia and it's really, really interesting.

Matt Dragun: 2:41

Senior leadership in Australia is seeing digital transformation and particularly achieving a return on investment as the number one challenge for not only 2025, but also the next three to five years, and this research backs up very much what I'm hearing from our clients in the market and the different trends that we're seeing from our clients and also the folk that we're speaking to and that I guess what I'm expecting or seeing is that executives and boards are, I guess, transitioning their focus to really look at benefit realisation from their transformation programs and there's a significant shift to not only, I guess, investing in transformation or technology project delivery, but also tracking the outcomes of the technology implementations and ensuring that there's a return on investment.

Matt Dragun: 3:42

I think previously for businesses, if you think about a manufacturing business, the biggest investments were in things like plant and equipment and it was very, very easy for boards and executives to track return on investment. They could look at throughput, they could look at volume of outputs With technology. I think what's happened, you know, over the past five or 10 years is organizations have invested significantly and now technology is their greatest investment. If you look at a line item in the P&L those tangible measurements of return on investment or being able to de-risk business or change their business risk profile so we're seeing a greater focus on what happens post-implementation.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 4:40

It's a good segue to one of the observations that I've been seeing and hearing so a lot of clients. From a PMO perspective. They're faced with sort of two scenarios. So you're either in an organisation, a department or a team that has both a dedicated change management function be it a change management centre of excellence or a head of change, with a core group of people underneath, or you are on the other side, where you might have some change management resources sprinkled across programs and projects but there's no sort of centralized function that brings them together.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 5:13

So, from a PMO perspective, what we're finding is that there becomes a need to start to fill some of those gaps, and so PMOs, and especially the ones that I've been speaking to, are trying to bring in and influence some of those really formal change management capabilities and starting to think about how to integrate those change activities within the governance and reporting structures, et cetera. And so, effectively, you've got chime embed change without dedicated change management teams, or you've got trying to do so with a change management team, but there is a disconnect between how PMOs and change historically, are working together, and so we'll cover a little bit of that as we go through as well. And one of the other things I'm seeing as well is in terms of sort of the, from a measurement perspective, some of the things and this is where I think tech comes into it so some of the things that PMOs are trying to focus more on is things like adoption rates adoption of new processes and tools and behaviours and thinking about things like stakeholder readiness.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 6:21

Typically, you see, that happen really well in change, but in PMO space there's usually a gap depending on the capability of the organisation, and then also things like risk mitigation et cetera. So I think between those perspectives, depending on whether people are sitting in the we have dedicated change management, which is great, it's mature and capable or you're sitting on the other side where you don't have it and the PMOs are trying to plug those gaps. So I think there's a little bit of that at the moment. Is that something you're sort of seeing, Matt, with some of the people that you speak with?

Matt Dragun: 6:55

Yeah, fatima, I love that example that you've presented and the different models because it's very consistent with what we see and I think what you're highlighting there is. What we're seeing at a board and exec level is that the PMO is being asked to report on things like adoption and embedment and benefit realisation to board and exec, and where we're seeing the crossover into change is a lot of the leading indicators associated with those metrics, like adoption, that you mentioned are actually the domain and change managers are the domain experts. So this is where I'm seeing a really it's a great opportunity for PMOs and change teams to come together to be able to meet the needs of the executives and board-level reporting, but also to deliver greater value to their organisations by collaborating more closely together. And that's where I think there's a huge opportunity, not only in 2025, but moving through the next few years, where we'll see PMO and change coming more closely together and looking to drive business outcomes as a collective.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 8:10

Awesome and I think we've got a couple of examples of that in just a minute which we'll get to and I think one of the things, matt, you and I speak about a lot is like that whole benefits realisation piece, which is often the neglected at least in the PMOs I work with is often the thing that is least thought about because it seems to be someone else's problem. So I think we can definitely talk about ways to integrate those PMO change to help drive the benefits as well.

Matt Dragun: 8:37

For sure.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 8:39

Okay, so let's share a little bit more. So I did a little bit of a quick Google search this morning in relation to project management office and change management globally and the interest graph over time using Google over the last 12 months. So I've noticed and being in PMO for the last 20 years and almost as much in change management, I've seen a significant shift in PMO and change management and at the moment, in the last few years, there seems to be a very much increase in popularity for PMOs, more than I've ever seen before. And I've been following this trend for the last 20 years and that's not for the lack of trying over the past, but there's been more emphasis in this space and I think this is a real big opportunity for change management which, as you can see from the graph, the blue line is change management and the red line, trending upwards, is actually PMO. So I think that there is probably, looking at this, a view that maybe there's some stagnation there, but working together, I think change management and PMO can equally promote each other and start to work together better and where there isn't change management, the PMO can step up and try to bring that sort of visibility to the need for change.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 9:56

So I think there's definitely some things that we know are better off, such as having those change management practices to drive some of those outcomes. We also know that having good change management also drives organisational agility and resilience, and in the last few years one of the big gaps has been the impact of so agile base small A agile, big A agile and how we actually incorporate change management to drive the behaviours that we want to see in these organisations. So I think there's a balance between the two and I think that there is definitely evidence to suggest A that change management practices embedded will drive greater outcomes there's lots of studies on that and B, with the PMO's rise in popularity at the moment, I think there's a really good opportunity for PMO and change to work together, so we're both trending upwards. I don't know, matt, if you've got any thoughts on that.

Matt Dragun: 10:53

Yeah, there's a couple of things you mentioned for Tima there. The first one was agility. One of the trends we're seeing with our clients is a real push to increase the agility of the operations of the business. So not necessarily agility in tech delivery or PMO space, but in the operations, to be agile and to be able to adopt change and adapt to new and changes in market condition in a more agile manner. And I think there's a great opportunity, where typically your PMOs and your projects have got a good handle on those things that drive agility for their area of the business, for the change managers to be an interface to help basically the organization drive its agility in that space. So I think there's a real opportunity there, especially, as you describe, if change and PMOs are working more closely together.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 11:54

And the only thing I'd add as well, just that you prompted, is I think it's important not to assume that all PMOs have the capabilities of change managers. They have different skill sets and there's definitely some similarities in some of the things they do. But I think for PMOs that are here today or teams that are running PMOs, reassessment of your skills and the structures you have within your PMO to ensure that those people that you are working with can support those change initiatives, particularly if you don't have change management as a function in your organisation as well.

Matt Dragun: 12:27

And Fatima, we're also seeing a trend with PMOs, or I guess one of the big pulls that we're seeing is how can we upskill people within an organisation to have a greater level of change management, understanding and capability both people within the PMO and then also people within the operations area of the business. So a lot of the support work that we're doing when we roll out the Mate technology, it's also building change capability across the organisation, within PMO and then also external to PMO.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 13:06

So that's a good segue then to our next point. So I like to sort of use this visual, very simple visual, to articulate sort of typically what we're seeing. Of course there's some, you know, separate situations where things may differ, but holistically I like to sort of think of it as for a long time, for as long as I can remember, when we think about change management, change management typically aligns to project management delivery. So you know, even 20 years ago, when we see change management they're usually embedded in delivery. They're working closely with the project managers, program directors, etc. Yes, they might interact with PMOs, but seldom. And then you've got the other side. So you're saying project management delivery teams working alongside the PMO. And so if you think about change management, I like to sort of say that it focuses outwards. Think about driving adoption Matt was just talking about that Managing stakeholder benefits, realisation, preparing teams for what's coming. So often they're thinking about those operational teams that Matt just mentioned.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 14:11

When we think about the PMR, I like to sort of think about them as focusing inwards, and when I say inwards, talking about sort of governance of projects, supporting the project managers, the project delivery teams and ensuring that delivery is on the right track.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 14:24

The project delivery teams and ensuring that delivery is on the right track. There is a gap between those two, and so to drive real success, the two disciplines need to work together. So this is where an alternative view of what it could look like makes more sense. Now, there's nothing revolutionary here, but fundamentally, what we're saying here is that when we think about change management and PMO taking a different approach to traditionally what's been done over the years and having seen this in many, many organizations, when we are not aligned, we're focused outwards and inwards in different directions there's actually a bit of a gap in terms of how we can align and execute on business readiness and that change that's needed. So I think the sweet spot is in that middle and it enables us to make sure that we're not just delivering from the perspective on paper, but we're actually driving change that will last within the organization. So there's obviously ways of integrating the two together, and we can talk about that in a moment, but any thoughts on that, Matt?

Matt Dragun: 15:46

deliver better solutions and to continue to iterate and improve the technical solutions that are being delivered.

Matt Dragun: 15:49

Where I see change facing outwards into the business is change needs to understand the ways of working and the processes that need to change and when you're deploying a new technology.

Matt Dragun: 16:04

So what needs to change outside of the technology in the business to extract maximum value from the technology that you're implementing? And also the change function not only needs to understand how the business operates today, but they also need to understand the future state. And so I think, if you look at the way PMO and projects look externally to the business, I think that's all about the feedback loop from users to drive tech outcomes. And then I think the role that change play for the PMO is actually understanding the current state of the business process, understanding where decisions get made, understanding how the business collaborates and uses the technology within their existing rituals and their day-to-day work to be able to drive business outcomes. And if you can really clarify each of those roles for change and for PMO facing externally, then I think once you've got that clarity of role, you can then work really closely together to drive the best outcomes 100% and like some of those examples that I can sort of relate to, based on sort of first-hand examples of working with different clients.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 17:20

So when we think about that communications part critical change PMO is critical for both. So from a PMO perspective we might be supporting detailed project schedules and milestones and deliverables and things like that. On the change management perspective, we might be developing out the comms strategy that's going to keep stakeholders informed. When we integrate both those plans, the PMO can make sure that the communication about the key project milestones is delivered, but also how those milestones will impact the business, how those milestones are going to help stakeholders understand the full context, how to help support change in reducing resistance. So that's like one specific example that I've got. Matt, do you have an example?

Matt Dragun: 18:01

Yeah, and I've just following the chat and Jen Zuber, who's an amazing change thought leader, popped a note in the chat that change also basically has the view of BAU change and what's happening outside of what the PMO is delivering. And I guess where I'm hearing Jen coming from is that the change team can also help the PMO get a perspective of what is the capacity and the volume or the capacity of the around when they deploy what they're deploying and then beyond that, how they track benefit. So, jen, thank you for that. That's a great add to us.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 18:59

I see another comment there. Matt from Charlotte's talked about the business transformation office. So reconciling or reconciliating PM and change management absolutely an option. And I think one of the things to consider about is, sometimes when we think about transformation, it depends on whether that transformation is like long lived and part of the DNA of an organisation, or if we're thinking about a short term and thinking about a transformation program that you know may go for a period of time that just then determines how much an organization is willing to invest in some of these things as well. So, yeah, absolutely, absolutely, really relevant, particularly the operational focus.

Matt Dragun: 19:35

Yeah, and I think that comment that you made there, Fatima, when I think about the difference between a transformation office and a PMO office. For me, transformation is built around one major technology implementation, like an ERP system, and it's got a finite lifespan, whereas a PMO is really set up to help the organisation maximise the value from continual deployment of new technologies or evolution of existing technologies.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 20:06

And I think the other thing then to add as well, thinking about that focus of depending on what that change is and again, of course some of the terminology we're using here may be different from company to country, which is fine, but even thinking about things like getting training and readiness programs, and so you know, the PMO might be supporting the systems and the tools and the implementation of them, whereas the change management team and resources might actually work to help develop the collateral needed to help the end users in how to use those systems and tools. And then there's a role there in terms of ongoing adoption and then maintenance as well. So I think there's lots of ways to bring these things together, and particularly because when we talk about change the comment made earlier was change management has a greater depth of relationship, depth and breadth with operations that lots of PMOs typically don't unless they're at an enterprise level. So I think there's definitely some learnings between the two for sure.

Matt Dragun: 21:02

Yeah, there's just another question in the chat that's come up, which is basically when you talk about change incorporating portfolio prioritisation and assessment, there's the differentiation between change variation as a term and then change management. One of the things that I like to call change management as an alternative is actually embedment, or supporting the embedment of technology and new ways of working. But I think that's a good differentiator, because we're definitely talking about how do you support the business, adopt and change the way they work so they can maximize the value from the technologies that you're implementing.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 21:46

It's so interesting because it's a very common occurrence, I know, when we're putting together the change control processes, the controlling scope, change timelines, et cetera, there's always a confusion around that point that Ashok has raised, and so I think this goes back to thinking about whatever it is, whether it's a department, an enterprise, a transformation program, whatever it is getting that messaging up front and getting alignment on you know the glossary of terms, if you like Is there something so simple that makes such an impact for stakeholders along that journey? I know we're experiencing that now, where we've had to get everyone aligned on what does go live actually mean?

Fatimah Abbouchi: 22:25

And that wasn't clear. So very relevant, definitely good question. Thanks, ashok. Okay, so let's get into a little bit more Matt.

Matt Dragun: 22:35

So this is a bit of a favourite slide of mine to present and basically I use Formula One as an analogy for the way change and project teams work together. But typically in the pre-season of Formula One I equate that to what change and project teams do during the early stages. So we do solution co-design, which is like building the car. We work in agile manners to iterate and get feedback and typically your change team really work on the analysis part. So who's going to be impacted by the change, what are those impacts look like and when are they going to be felt? The next part and I'll get you to click through Fatima is basically the testing phase when they get to the Formula One track. So this is where you do your piloting, your user acceptance testing, your training and this is where you change team are typically working to really help the organization get ready for the deployment event. The next piece that we look at and in the Formula One and I'll get you to click through again fatima um is the deployment and go live support and hypercare and traditionally what I equate this to in formula one is the um qualifying or your. You know it's before the race starts. It's to get your position at the start line, um, before you actually go to compete for race points, and what this looks like is typically your hypercare period, where there might be some coaching, there might be some significant support for the go live event within the business. Find typically is when the race starts and when there's championship points on the line, which is the Grand Prix race, change and projects traditionally disappear, right, and I find that really fascinating because the change managers are actually the ones that are perfectly positioned to be the pit crew for the business during the race. They know exactly what the technology can deliver, so they know how to drive the car, how to get the most out of it, and they're perfectly placed to be able to support the folk in the business who are busy running day to day get the most out of the new the car or the new technology that they're deploying.

Matt Dragun: 25:10

So when I think about the future of change management and the thing that really strikes me about this analogy is it reminds me of the 80-20 theory right, most organisations will invest 80% of their resources or probably 90%, 95% of the resource in project delivery and, like pre-go-live to hypercare support, in change, and about 5% in when there's actually value or points to be won on the line.

Matt Dragun: 25:40

So when I think about what change and PMO can deliver, moving forward, and where the trend is, it's extending change support for the business to really support behavior change, to help drive adoption, to help track benefit realization, and I think change and PMO can do that together. And the reason I think there's such a close link is because the PMO are the ones that are going to be asked by the executive and board for the reporting on these metrics, but the change team are the ones that understand the business and have those relationships with the stakeholders to be able to support the business and extract the data back during the post-go-live period. So where I'm seeing the trend shift and where I'm seeing, I think, the early adopters and those organisations that are pushing the boundaries in terms of getting greater value out of their change and PMO resources, this is where they're playing.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 26:47

I'll just screen, go to the end of your visual. I think, um, it's a really good call out and I really like the way that you talk about, like, the reporting. Obviously we know a core part of pmo's world is reporting. We'll never get away from that. But in order for us actually to understand those metrics and getting that data, I think, like you said, the as much, as as much as you can have the most effective PMO leader and I like to pride myself on doing a really good job there's just not enough capacity in the day a week a month to go and seek out some of the feedback and insights that you get from the operational teams and the end users that are you know, impacted effectively by that change.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 27:24

So I think that's really important and that definitely can feed into reporting being a more holistic, accurate picture, and I also think that the it's very timely, by the way, for you to use the Grand Prix as an example considering.

Matt Dragun: 27:36

I do. I thought that Very good.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 27:38

You want to come up with another example for later in the year or something, maybe, like I don't know, baking a cake or something, but yeah yeah, I think it's a really good way, one of the things that you, when you've shared this with me in the past, I think sometimes we talk about. When projects finish, usually the project manager gets reallocated onto something else and benefits fall off the cliff because there's not been a direct handover of those benefits into operations, into finance, into VAT, wherever it's got to go. But I think integrating that at the beginning and all the way throughout the project will definitely garner a better result.

Matt Dragun: 28:12

Yeah, and I think you're 100% right, and Jo Rinaldi, who's another one of my favourite change folk in Australia. Nice to have you on board, jo. But she mentioned that performance scorecards, post-go-live and then maintaining goals and not just reaching it are a really important component. And I think what I'm seeing and the shift that I'm seeing where organizations are doing well in this space is they've got a discipline around identifying the leading metrics associated with their benefit realization targets. And often those leading metrics are around people, so they're around behaviour change and tracking adoption, with the intent that once you shift behaviour and you get the right levels of adoption, then the outcome of that will result in achieving the benefit realisation targets. And so I think you know, given the role and the expertise that change managers bring to the table, they're the ones that are perfectly positioned to support the PMO, to help define what those metrics should look like, to get post-go-live, and also to support the business to track those metrics and make sure that they're on track to achieve the targets.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 29:32

And I think, just to reiterate and I see a comment around we're talking about EPMO. So, talking more broadly, we will cover some examples at a program level as well and in some of the questions. So this does not just relate to enterprise. But when we think about enterprise, obviously that's where we're talking about prioritisation of initiatives, strategic alignment, et cetera. So yeah, but it's definitely all the way through from project right through to enterprise.

Matt Dragun: 29:57

Yeah, and Fatima on the enterprise piece. I go back to Jen Zuber's comment. In and around, I think the enterprise, pmo and especially the prioritisation conversations, the great value that the change team can add is providing visibility in terms of BAU change to help inform release timings, to help inform prioritisation conversations and to help inform those strategic decisions. And you know, I think when I think EPMO, I think strategy right and I think your value chain, and so the idea of being able to connect what's happening in the business with decisions that are impacting how you deliver against your value chain and how you prioritise initiatives is driving strategic value in terms of what change teams can do to support EPMOs.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 30:54

A really good example that just came to mind. So, having worked in a large program of work within an organisation about a year ago, they had it was quite significant, so about $30 or $40 million, and the program was rolling out some new tech change, so some new HRAS systems et cetera, and in that rollout it was enterprise-wide, so there was no department function, operational area untouched. The change management function, in this regard, needed to understand where because they attempted to do this multiple times, this program had attempted to be done several times before and on this third time they embedded a better change management, I guess, maturity practice, et cetera. Through that process, one of the things that the change management team needed to do is to articulate where the challenges were in terms of readiness, adoption, awareness of the change over a period of about two to three years, because it was a large transformation program, and so they then would run different assessments about from all the way, from thinking about your visual here all the way from the very beginning, so fundamental awareness, your visual here all the way from the very beginning, so away fundamental awareness to right through to readiness and then adoption, and in that process what they found very interestingly is that there were hot spots across the organization that were not, um, I guess, in terms of the, the metrics that they were using.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 32:30

Now, what happened in that regard is that those change management resources worked closely with the PMO and the broader program PMO and they came up with strategies on how to address these. I guess hotspots, specific comms, there was putting posts on billboards, there was all these different sort of changes, and the PMO helped to embed that into the timelines and update the schedule accordingly. And if it wasn't for them working together, there may not have been that visibility up to the executive level, which the PMO had control of at the time. So it's just one small example that I just thought of that I thought might be useful.

Matt Dragun: 33:11

Yeah, just building on that, Fatima, I've got an example from a resources global resources company in a very similar situation that we're implementing technology to support their maintenance area of the business and they'd had five attempts at implementing the technology and aligning the roles around using technologies across their different sites and they'd failed four times.

Matt Dragun: 33:37

And on the fifth attempt, the one thing that they did is they used change management assessment tools, like you're describing, at different milestones across the delivery and post-go-live period and that enabled them to identify where in the organization there was resistance and to be really specific about basically the tactics and the engagements that they used to bring everyone up to speed and get them moving at the same pace.

Matt Dragun: 34:10

Right, because what we typically see with large-scale deployments is one area of the business will charge ahead, they'll be the early adopters, they'll smash it out of the water and then you'll have pockets in the middle and then you'll have one or two or three that are really lagging and it's the lagging guys and girls that will actually drag the whole project and the benefit realization piece back. So what I hear you're describing is the importance in the change tools that you're using to be able to identify the specific groups in the business and areas in the business where you need to focus effort. I think is really important and I think there's a great role for technology to play in that. But I also know that good change managers and a lot of those that are on the call will have tools to be able to suggest to PMO that at this milestone, this is what we need to test and how we need to test it. So I think, yeah, that's a really, really valid point that you raise.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 35:12

yeah, that that that's a really, really valid point that you raise. Okay, so I think hopefully we've convinced everyone that there is obviously importance around change management. But let's talk a little bit about why do we think change management is going to mature more so in 2025 and, what's important, what's driving it? So maybe, matt, if you want to kick us off with your thoughts on that, yeah, look I.

Matt Dragun: 35:32

I think the key thing is greater level of executive and board focus on benefit realizations and we spoke about that at the top, so I won't go into it in more detail. But I've definitely seen a shift, especially with the large scale transformations and where you're talking that the board is looking at, you know, investment in the hundreds of millions of dollars. We've got a client in the US that's looking at a billion dollar ERP implementation program, which just blows my mind. That number it just, it absolutely blows my mind. But when you think about the scale and the scale of investment, it makes sense that boards and executives are really, really focused on the benefit realisation piece and post go live Because at the end of the day, they're looking after a shareholder value and return on that investment, on that investment.

Matt Dragun: 36:36

The other area that I see for Tima and this when I'm talking to executives they talk typically in two areas. So they talk about what's going to return value and grow the bottom line and what's going to reduce our risk profile or shift our risk profile. So we've got reduced risk across the business. The other thing that I see that PMOs and change managers will need to do, moving forward, is connect what the technology and the change is doing to how that supports reducing business risk across a business's risk profile. They're the two things that I'm continually hearing that I think will drive the maturity in 2025.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 37:19

I'd probably add from a PMO perspective, that obviously you know I'm going to say the word AI. With the rise of AI and data analytics and other things like that, having the ability to sort of, track and predict both project and change management outcomes is going to become more sophisticated. We're already seeing many, many, many, if not all, the PPM tools out in the market. As a starting point, I've already embedded that over the years and some are accelerating that at pace at the moment. We're also seeing that the maturity around these is starting to increase as well. We're seeing plug-ins to as well. We're seeing plugins to you know, things we use day to day, like your Microsoft Teams, etc. That are there to help test some of these sentiments, and it's one of the things that, again, that Mate does as well, which is good to know.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 38:09

Thinking about adoption rates and sentiment analysis, like, for example, one of the things you know, just standard technology that exists in almost every organisation, whether it's Confluence or SharePoint, simple things PMOs can look at is the number of times that someone is visiting a particular page in terms of like a process or a how-to guide or wherever the information is mostly being sought after, and then focusing some effort on understanding why people are going to that point and then evolving that further as well.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 38:42

And again, that's not something you need technology for, but it's something we can do today, whether we're a small PMO or a large PMO. And then I think the other side of it as well is, I mentioned earlier, around the PMO plugging gap. So as much as we've got really skilled change management people out there, unfortunately in some organisations regardless of whether you're, you know, big or small they sometimes don't want to fund those resources for whatever reason, and we want to change that. But in the absence of having good change management capability in-house, we need to think about how we as PMOs ourselves can uplift and upskill so that we can be change ready, and looking at embracing that sort of change culture that you would get from having that sort of resource in-house as well.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 39:30

So, I think there's things you can do, tech aside, but then also we're seeing a shift and PPM is becoming something that's becoming a lot more prominent as well. So, yeah, there's a couple of thoughts there.

Matt Dragun: 39:42

Yeah, Fatima, and there was a question about resourcing change teams in terms of size of team and where do you get those resources from.

Matt Dragun: 39:50

In the chat, and I think one of the things that I would share is I've seen businesses look to upskill their you know business resources or operational resources in change, but typically that needs to be supported by someone with change expertise.

Matt Dragun: 40:10

If you're going to take that route and I've seen it done really well where organizations bring in a small chain or team of specialists to upskill their BAU resources for projects and those change specialists work as coaches and advisors to the BAU folk who are on temporary assignment. And then I've seen, obviously, organizations that have built dedicated change management office capacities with dedicated resources. So I think it's it's really that question and the answer to that question is it's. It's dependent on organizational capacity, resource availability and also size of project and size of and complexity of the PMO that you're managing. I would always advocate for using specialist PR change management resources in some capacity, because they do bring a detailed knowledge of tools, how to apply tools and how to engage with stakeholders in a way that is going to get the best response and best level of engagement out of those groups.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 41:22

And from my perspective, what I typically would start by asking is first of all understand what the capabilities that are needed. So you've got to start and understand what you've got or don't have within your program, your department, your enterprise, and then understand obviously where the capability gaps may be. So, for example, pulling resources from BAU or business as usual operational teams to come in and do that change management role. If they've got the capability from maybe past projects, that's great. If they don't, then getting some supportive, I guess change management coaching will definitely help. But what I find really useful is, regardless of the size of the organisation, having people from broader operational teams.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 42:02

We're doing it at the moment with the program I'm working on.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 42:04

We know we need subject matter expertise from finance and from corporate risk and from compliance and all of these functions. So we're getting them into the program for, say, two to four hours a week and they're wearing what I call a hatted roll. It just means it's not their full-time job. And what we're doing is the consultancy teams that are in there running this program as the system integrator. Basically they're sort of helping to upskill those people and then they go back into the organization and they constantly cycle through in a positive way. So over each project, over time, they build up that capability and that skill so that they retain that knowledge and they take it back into the organisation. So I think that's a really good way of bringing in that BAU lens and enabling that to go back into the organisation and over time you might find that some of those people become your change champions and effectively are the people that you would lean on as more dedicated full-time roles in the programs that are more complex, like that $1 billion one that you talked about.

Matt Dragun: 43:07

Yeah, fatima, and it's a good point, and I think some of the commentary and trends that I'm hearing around, specifically using the large scale consulting firms is one that they tend is how do you integrate them into your ways of working so that you can extract value from the time that they invest in your business and continue to grow your capability. Rather than what I have seen as a model historically is the consultant will come in with their own set of tools, will execute the change, but they'll take the learnings and the capability with them, and I think that's a big missed opportunity for organisations, and all organisations will need to use consultants at some point in time. It makes sense because you need to be able to upscale and right-size your resource, but how you use consultants and ensuring that the consultants are working to your ways of working in your frameworks, I think is a really important governance step if you want to grow your change capability and if you want to build that into PMO.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 44:31

A hundred percent and as consultants, we both can say that openly. Don't bring consultants in and then not have a process in which to manage them, because you'll lose.

Matt Dragun: 44:41

I feel like I'm doing myself out of work right at some point in time. We shouldn't say that I'm being honest, that's okay.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 44:49

Okay, so let's just talk through a few ideas about how PMOs can elevate their role and incorporate change management better, and we won't go through all of these. I just wanted to sort of share a couple of ideas because we are about 15 minutes from time, so thinking about some of the stuff we've already talked about. So one of the gaps, as I said, if you don't have a change management capability, there is no harm, and I did this a few years ago, where I attended change management training and got a feel for all the sorts of change management frameworks and models, et cetera, and then right-sized that for the organizations that I was working in so effectively starting to build in some of that capability within the organization. Now this is in the absence of having change management itself. One of the other things that I love to emphasise and do so as part of what we do in terms of the AMO way is we help companies identify change and execute it. Now the change I'm not talking about $1 billion ERP programs, but they are microchanges. So this is where I may suggest introducing microprojects, and doing that enables us to run an enterprise-wide visibility of all of the sort of microchanges that we need to make and think of it as like a role in continuous improvement program. It's something that a PMO can fundamentally facilitate and drives really good outcomes.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 46:15

Then there's some other ideas as well. We talked about feedback loops earlier. That was one of the things. Readiness assessment, so thinking about impact assessment, the change and the governance component, how to bring those together and then measuring change. Whether you've got tech or you don't have tech, if you do great, leveraging the tools that enable you to do that as well is another opportunity. And then the framework. So I wouldn't go and build a project management delivery framework without integrating some elements of change. And if you've got the ability to have change people involved in that process, by all means, absolutely include them in that process as well. There's just a couple of quick examples, matt, did you have any you wanted to share?

Matt Dragun: 46:55

No further examples, fatima.

Matt Dragun: 46:57

Obviously, we collaborated on this prior, but I think what I would say is and just reinforce the point that you made there that as you're building out your frameworks, I think it's really important to have your change and your PMO stakeholders at the table, because not only do I think it's really important to have your change and your PMO stakeholders at the table, because not only do I think it's important to align on the roles and have a governance structure in place that defines that for what change will do to support PMO and what the PMO will do to support the change team, I also think it will open up opportunities for the PMO to think about how they can mature their reporting by integrating change metrics, and it will open up a whole lot of opportunities in regards to identifying how, by collaborating between change and PMO, you can add greater value for your stakeholders, your exec, your board and your general business stakeholders who are going to be recipients of change.

Matt Dragun: 47:56

So I think there's, you know, getting together and having that conversation about defining what that looks like and what the roles look like is a really critical step if you want to get your PMO and change to work really well together.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 48:13

And, in the spirit of PMO, make sure it's documented so clearly. Establish those roles and responsibilities, align those roles and responsibilities across your life cycle and understand how and where they fit in, with or without having a change management function. So make sure you have that aligned as well. That'll help everybody to be on the same page as well.

Matt Dragun: 48:33

Yeah, and it's a great step to go through for your external stakeholders as well. If you can go to your executive or your GMs and go, this is what PMO is going to do for the business. This is exactly what change is going to do for the business. This is where our crossover is and how we work together, and these are the reporting outputs that we're going to deliver, so you're going to be able to make better decisions. I think that's a huge in terms of positioning the value of PMO and change working together. I think that's a huge benefit of of taking the time to go through and and clearly define the roles and and the crossovers and collaboration points.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 49:12

Great. So just quickly share a couple, just a couple of insights very quickly on this example and then we'll get into some questions. So there was this particular organisation. It was a large government program, so it wasn't an enterprise, it was a government program. They had a big four consultancy running the change management and was fully integrated. So they had a complete change management team and again it was a big four consultancy.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 49:42

And in that process and in that time there was a lot of gaps and there was a significant turnover of their change management resources. For whatever reason, maybe because they were unable to drive outcomes, maybe because the environment they were in was very, very low maturity. There was fundamentally flaws in the process, in the way that they were rolling out the responsiveness they were getting from the internal teams as well. There was quite a significant challenge in and amongst this organisation, in this large program. So one of the things that they have to do is figure out how to change the way that they're working. And partway through the program, around the testing phase, they ended up having a change of head at the PMO level. So at the time they were just having a project manager leading the program under a program manager, no PMO and then they brought in a PMO, and this is where we ended up coming in and actually understanding what the lay of the land was and what some of the challenges were.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 50:43

The PMO and the change team started to work together. They started to integrate and work together to develop or reset rather a structured framework for how we were going to implement and execute this change, both from an internal delivery perspective but also from an external stakeholder perspective. We had the roles and responsibilities you know, your process, your tools, all of those things were done, but we embedded structured change control processes at the entry and exit gates across the lifecycle. We also made sure there was clarity around what training was needed and at what points and embedded that into our timelines. And we also made sure we redefined the role of change management, because at the time, as I said, it was focused very much outwards and there was no sort of internal support for the delivery teams that were responsible for driving the internal change.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 51:29

So too much emphasis externally and not enough emphasis internally. The low maturity environment did not help. This program had cycled through three program directors until the third time and cycled through three or four change managers until finally. The only thing that made this change happen was not the resources, but it was the change and the PMO working together. That was the single biggest impact to the program being successful and delivering. So, just as a small example of how a well-structured, sustainable, integrated way of working between change and PMO in a program can actually come back on track, Fatima, thanks for sharing.

Matt Dragun: 52:12

There's a question in the chat and I know we're short on time, but the question was should the push for change management come from the PMO or the business?

Matt Dragun: 52:23

I think my comment here is I feel and in my experience, change management has found it very difficult to get a voice in a lot of organisations and to get traction for support, and I've also seen that a lot of stakeholders in business who make decisions, they don't understand the change processes or the value that change management can add.

Matt Dragun: 52:51

So my response to the question is should the push come from change management or for change management from add? So my response to the question is should the push come from change management or for change management from the PMO? I think change management needs advocates at the highest level of the business and if you're a PMO director, I would strongly recommend that you one advocate for your change team and investment in your change team, because otherwise I'm not sure, depending on the organization, that the change team will be able to get the traction that they need. And that's a really frank and brutal response, but it's probably based on my experience and look, I speak to a number of CFOs around the value of change and I get a lot of blank looks when I talk about engagement and adoption and people. So when the guys in those seats and girls in those seats are your decision makers, I think any type of advocacy and influence to support change is really important.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 53:56

I second that and I'm very supportive and sitting in that PMO director role many, many times. I think the only caveat I would add, charlotte, to your question is if the PMO has the influence and typically the higher up a PMO sits depending on its reporting line, it will have the influence and it can advocate. Where it doesn't and I've been in many roles in the past that just doesn't have a seat at the table or doesn't have strategic alignment, doesn't have any authority, really you'll struggle. So I think that depending on who has the greater influence whether it's change or the PMO in the organization, either way advocating for each other, or the PMO in the organisation, either way advocating for each other and I think that, particularly when I think about it with my you know consulting hat on, when you're going into an organisation and you're saying you've got challenges in this space over here with all your governance, and then you've got challenges when it comes to change management, by suggesting that you can help bring the two together and solve effectively problems in both camps with a joint approach, is going to be far more greater and more likely that they'll invest the resource, the time, the capability, the capacity needed to help to influence and improve the organisation, the program, et cetera. So, yes, budget 100% is the challenge, but to get budget you have to. Going back to my micro projects idea if you can start by identifying I do this in every single PMI I run identify all of the micro changes and micro changes are things you can fix within a day or a week, no more and doing that, then you can start getting runs on the board and cross-promote visibility internally and externally to drive influence, and then people will want to bring you on board to do more in their areas and that's already happening in a number of examples I can see.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 55:47

So we Matt I think got almost 100 questions and I went through them before we put our presentation together and I think we've covered a lot not all of them. So I'm sure there's probably some subsequent questions. We can think about what we haven't covered and distribute, if you do. If anyone has any additional questions that haven't been answered, or if you really really feel strongly about getting an answer, send me an email and I'll see to it for us to get a response to you and we'll try to get that back to you.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 56:18

Just to close out, a couple of quick points. Matt and I are doing a joint PMO change governance workshops, and these are corporate workshops that we'll be facilitating, where we work together to help you understand the role of PMR and change within your organisation what alignment looks like, looking at your existing structures, making suggestions on best practice and what's worked elsewhere and then help you to really define an action plan to move forward. And that may include supporting you with the business case guidance to execs, or it may just be some recommendations that might change the trajectory of your function. So if you're interested in that, I'll put a link in the chat just to put your interest for that. And then, quickly one other thing that Matt would talk about. He's briefly mentioned tech, so I just wanted to quickly go to that.

Matt Dragun: 57:10

Yeah, as part of our organisation, mate, we've developed a significant technology platform that is around delivering change management intelligence, and I think when we spoke about how the change management reporting can really help enable PMOs to not only to report to exec and board with confidence, but also really drive adoption and benefit realisation in the business, the product's been developed around achieving those outcomes. So if you're interested in a technology solution to support change and also that has significant benefits for PMO in regards to reporting and engagement decision-making prioritisation, please give us a call. Love to share with you the capabilities of the technology and also our experience with implementing it in large-scale organisations.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 58:09

Thanks, matt, so we'll put a link in the chat. If you are interested in either the workshop or the tech, or even if you just feel like asking us a question, send it through and we'll make sure that we share it, sticking to time, as we need to in PMO land, and being on time. We're pretty much at the end of our presentation and our conversation today. We hope we got through some of your questions. We will send the recording out within a week, so for those that would like to play it back. Otherwise, as I said, the link is in the chat if you're interested in finding out anything about anything we've covered today, and we hope that you've found today to be helpful. And, yeah, thanks for your feedback and, matt, thank you. As always, love working together and appreciate all your valuable insights as a change management expert.

Matt Dragun: 58:59

Yeah, it's always a pleasure, Fatima, Thank you for having me and yeah, can't wait for our next conversation.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 59:06

I know We'll have to do a follow-up just to go through the 100-plus questions.

Matt Dragun: 59:11

Totally.

Fatimah Abbouchi: 59:13

Awesome. Well, thanks everyone. Thanks for joining. Thanks for the feedback. Um, as I said, let us know if you've got any questions. We will welcome them and, uh, we hope you had a good day, enjoy the rest of your day. Thanks everyone, bye thanks, all bye.