Maturing Professional Services: Project Management

Professional Services is broken down into 6 key components: Time Management, Project Management, Selling Services, Resource Management, Skills Management and Services Billing. In this blog, we address the maturity curve of Project Management. The maturity curve consists of: Initial, Repeatable, Controlled, Optimized, and Continuous Improvement. Project management is a critical component of services organizations whether your services packages are Fixed Fee, T&E, Milestone or hybrid structures. We provide both process and Certinia PSA product focus areas for identification and improvement. Let’s dive right in!

Maturity Level 1: Initial

1. Characteristics: PM is assigned. No consistency between projects. No data standards.

2. Primary Output: System of record for all Projects

3. Process Focus Areas:

   • Project Created for all Billable projects 

   • Projects are associated with the relevant Account (customer) 

   • Contractual planned hours are populated in the project 

   • Resources are assigned to the appropriate projects

   • Actual hours are being logged against the appropriate project 

   • Project closure process is consistent

4. Product Focus Areas:

   • Projects Created and Tracked 

   • Planned Hours 

   • Assignments 

   • Stages (e.g. open, closed) 

   • Tracking Actual Hours 

   • Tracking Actual T&E

Maturity Level 2: Repeatable

1. Characteristics: Some consistency between Projects. Basic data standards. Analyzing project performance at end of project.

2. Primary Output: Understanding of project (historically)

3. Process Focus Areas:

   • Projects are created in close alignment with contracted line items (deliverables, billing, etc)

   • PMs are actively managing resource schedules

   • Billing is driven by project actuals (time or deliverables) 

   • Costs and Margin captured on project 

   • PMs are capturing Project status

4. Product Focus Areas:

   • Project Templates 

   • Milestones or Rate Cards 

   • Create Project from Oppty 

   • Tracking Actual Costs 

   • Core Analytics (e.g. burnup) 

   • Planned Vs. Actual Health

   • Billing Event Generation 

   • PM Approval of time and expense

Maturity Level 3: Controlled

1. Characteristics: Ability to forecast labor and analyze metrics during project. Strong data consistency.

2. Primary Output: Understanding of active and future projects, including profitability

3. Process Focus Areas:

   • Changes to scope, budget, and resources are managed 

   • PM maintains a detailed project plan in PSA 

   • Revenue, Costs, and Margin can be measured on Projects 

   • Scheduled Revenue is being managed on Projects (backlog) 

   • Metrics can be analyzed across a collection of projects

   • Capturing CSAT on Projects

4. Product Focus Areas:

   • Status Report (Output) 

   • Tasks & Gantt 

   • Change Requests 

   • Balanced Scorecard 

   • Advanced Analytics  (e.g. Sched Risk, Backlog)

   • Track Payment status of Billing Events

   • CSAT Measurement/Integration

Maturity Level 4: Optimized

1. Characteristics: Certinia PSA is streamlining PM processes for consistency and efficiency. Metrics same across all projects

2. Primary Output: Collaborative Project Management and Revenue Forecasting

3. Process Focus Areas:

   • Risks and Issues are being managed on customer projects 

   • PMs generate a comprehensive project status report for customers 

   • PMs managing estimate-to-complete on projects 

   • Ability to measure revenue, costs, and margin at a portfolio level

   • Ability to forecast revenue, margin, and costs for the business

4. Product Focus Areas:

   • Track Risks & Issues 

   • Online Community for customer collaboration

   • Services Revenue Forecasting 

   • Project Versioning 

   • Engagements/Project Hierarchy 

   • Mobile App 

   • Services CPQ

Maturity Level 5: Continuous Improvement

1. Characteristics: Ongoing trend analysis of projects. Leveraging Experience to better staff & execute

2. Primary Output: Continuous Improvement of Delivery

3. Process Focus Areas:

   • Ability to measure risk trends across projects 

   • Comparing original scope to planned effort to actual time to continuously improve standard estimates 

   • Mature labor & budget analysis; feedback into sales cycle

4. Product Focus Areas:

   • Trend Analysis (total lifetime cost, value, cost of sale) 

   • Services profitability evaluation 

   • Sales Estimates vs PM Planned vs Actuals

We all strive for continuous improvement. However, identifying current and ideal maturity is critical to achieving continuous improvement. Enjoy this blog, check out the other 5 professional services maturity blogs. Ready to dive into your professional services maturity journey? Take the next right step and reach out to our team!