IT Project Portfolio Management
Doing The Right Things Right
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
What is IT Project Portfolio Management?
The Project Management Institute (PMI) defines Project Portfolio Management (PPM) as “the centralized
management of one or more portfolios, which includes identifying, prioritizing, authorizing, managing, and
controlling projects, programs, and other related work, to achieve specific strategic business objectives.1”
IT PPM, then, is collectively managing a group of IT projects in a way that is efficient and works toward an
overall objective.
Although this definition is technically correct, most organizations see IT PPM as a way to effectively
capture, organize, prioritize, and manage an ever-changing and growing number of IT projects in a way
that provides management with a clear view of its projects in terms of level of effort, cost, time to
complete, risk, priority, progress, and payback2.
Visibility into these key areas provides management with a means to ensure projects selected for
investment meet the organization’s strategies and objectives. Additionally, it provides management with
a tool to ensure projects are delivered effectively and within their planned contribution to the portfolio.
PPM provides the “big picture,” informing management decisions on the optimal mix and sequencing of
proposed projects to best achieve organizational goals.
Background
The ProObject Project Management Practice provides project management support services to answer
today’s complex technology initiatives, implementations, and software development engineering
processes. Project management is both art and science, requiring sophisticated management, technical,
and people skills. In today's competitive environment, though, it's just as important to do the right things
as it is to do things right. Focusing on doing the right things through PPM aligns client investments with
client goals, thereby selecting opportunities that deliver the highest return from scarce resources.
Building upon and broadening our PM expertise to include holistic, portfolio-based solutions positions
ProObject as our clients’ project and portfolio management experts of choice.
Purpose
This White Paper will discuss advantages that are directly derived by the use of three leading PPM
software applications. The focus is on enabling the organization to collectively manage its IT projects
with PPM software in a way that is efficient and works toward strategic business objectives.
Assumptions
The White Paper’s main premise is that technology enhances capabilities. Therefore, PPM is addressed
only in relation to its performance with the assistance of PPM software. Discussion will revolve around
three leading PPM software products. A complete inventory of generally accepted processes associated
with PPM is not appropriate in this forum. Some characteristics may be mentioned, but only to illustrate
software capabilities.
1
Project Management Institute, Inc., The Standard For Portfolio Management (Newtown Square, PA:
Project Management Institute, Inc., 2006) 5.
2
“Evaluating and Selecting PPM Software,” Evaluating and Selecting PPM Software, Michael Wood,
14 Jan. 2008 http://www.gantthead.com/article.cfm?ID=239750
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
Baseline
As a baseline for examining the individual PPM applications, expectations will be defined. To establish
this reference point, the White Paper will use the nine knowledge areas described in the Project
Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK)3: These areas are pivotal to successfully managing single
projects as well as managing multiple projects through programs and portfolios4:
• Integration (portfolio) management.
• Time management
• Scope management
• Cost management
• Quality management
• Human Resource management
• Communication management
• Risk management
• Procurement management
The White Paper will compare and contrast PPM applications based on their approach to these nine
areas.
Discussion
Today’s PPM software has evolved far beyond the capabilities of early desktop systems such as
Microsoft’s Project (Standard Edition) to packages that enable collaboration, analysis, financial
management, portfolio creation and maintenance, workflow management, and much more. Within the
PPM software market, there are three key players, each of which is a Leader in the Gartner 2008 Magic
Quadrant for IT Project and Portfolio Management5: 1) CA Clarity 8.1 2) Primavera 6.0 (P6) 3) Microsoft
EPM 2007. In addition to examining each application’s approach to the nine knowledge areas, key
features of each will be discussed followed by “strengths” and “cautions” provided by Gartner6.
CA Clarity 8.1
Clarity is a Web-based application. It integrates seamlessly with desktop project management
applications Open Workbench and Microsoft Project, making it easy to launch the preferred scheduling
tool from within CA. Additionally, Clarity can be integrated with most enterprise CRM and ERP
applications, as well as Microsoft Office, through the use of APIs based on Java and XML.
Enterprises can use Clarity Studio to create customized interfaces for different people across the
business. End users can customize their own view to tailor the application to their exact requirements.
Integration (portfolio) management – CA Clarity IT Portfolio Manager’s custom dashboards and portal
views provide visibility into the total cost of each project, aggregating the investments required to
complete that project. By offering real-time visibility into status, total cost, effort, and business value of
each project, CA Clarity IT Portfolio Manager provides a structured environment for deciding which
projects, programs and initiatives to fund, which to sustain, and which to terminate.
3
Project Management Institute, Inc., The Project Management Book of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide), 3rd
Edition (Newtown Square, PA: Project Management Institute, Inc., 2004) 71.
4
Project Management Institute, Inc., Standard 47
5
“Magic Quadrant for IT Project and Portfolio Management,” Magic Quadrant for IT Project and Portfolio
Management, Gartner, Inc., 13 Jun 2008
http://mediaproducts.gartner.com/reprints/primavera/157924.html.
6
Gartner, Inc.
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
Time management – The CA Clarity Project Manager module provides a rich set of tools for activity
definition and sequencing, schedule development, estimating, budgeting, resource allocation and time
capture. For advanced scheduling and baselining, CA Clarity’s integration with Open Workbench and
Microsoft Project is seamless and bi-directional.
Scope management – Scope planning, scope definition, and WBS creation are provided by the CA
Clarity Project Manager.
Cost management – The CA Clarity IT Portfolio Manager provides insight into total project costs and
enables one-to-one comparisons across all IT investments. All components of a project — assets,
applications, people, expenses, such as those associated with time, travel, equipment or other materials,
and ongoing support — to present a comprehensive “bill of materials” for each project. CA Clarity IT
Portfolio Manager also includes an integrated scorecard to drive portfolio planning and analysis.
Quality management – The CA Clarity Risk and Controls Manager provides a global repository that
maps internal policies, procedures, and SLAs, as well as external regulatory requirements for existing or
new risks and controls. The CA Clarity Risk and Controls Manager improves the overall quality of
controls and increases capacity for continuously monitoring, managing, and reporting on them. By
providing a dashboard view of risks and controls, the solution streamlines the compliance process,
replacing the typical unsustainable mix of multiple systems and ad-hoc spreadsheets, charts and
documents.
Human Resource management – CA Clarity Resource Manager includes four major components: Skills
Management, Resource Finder, Capacity Planning, and Resource Requisitioning. CA Clarity Skills
Management provides a method for tracking the skill sets of individuals, including their development,
experience, and interest levels. Resource Finder provides a means for quickly searching for and
selecting resources. The Capacity Planning feature in CA Clarity Resource Manager provides insight into
the organization’s portfolio, showing how overall work (demand) compares with overall resource
availability (capacity). Resource Requisitioning provides an efficient and orderly mechanism for
communicating resource requirements to resource managers.
Communication management – Clarity’s collaborative features enable team members to access a
central calendar with all related tasks and project milestones. Team members can discuss projects, bring
issues to light, and share information through a centralized discussion function. Additionally, Clarity
includes a tool called Knowledge Store, which acts as a central repository for documents
Risk management – The CA Clarity Risk and Controls Manager supports risk management with
comprehensive tools and reports that support predictive analysis and evaluation of “what-if” scenarios
that ensure all potential outcomes are considered and planned for. Risk is managed across the portfolio
with the CA Clarity IT Portfolio Manager, balancing risk tolerance with profit maximization to select the
right mix of projects.
Procurement management – Although CA Clarity provides a means for planning purchases,
acquisitions, and contracting, no explicit features for procurement management are provided.
Strengths
• Customers cite Clarity's process engine and workflow capabilities as flexible enough to configure
and customize Clarity to support the specific way customers manage work.
• CA is aggressively marketing and targeting sales worldwide, investing heavily in educating
established non-PPM CA customers and potential new PPM prospects in the value of PPM and
Clarity, going well beyond the standard use of annual user conferences and advertising to garner
new business.
• The latest version of Clarity, 8.1, provides more support for application and IT service portfolio
management as CA's IT planning and control (ITPC) vision continues to materialize. 8.1 also
extends financial management functionality.
Cautions
• Professional services and consulting appear to be stretched to the point of inconsistency, with
some inexperienced consultants and some communication issues internal to CA; customer
service and technical-support responsiveness is reportedly slow.
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
• Customers continue to ask for improvements to Clarity in the areas of performance, data storage
and archiving, and out-of-the-box reporting.
• Workbench users should assume that CA will de-emphasize development and will support Open
Workbench integration with the Clarity Server.
Primavera 6.0 (P6)
Primavera P6 is a centralized, enterprise application that is accessed by two forms of client. One form of
client is the P6 Client Module which is a thick, desktop-based client-server application. The other form is
a thin, web-based application known as P6 Web Access that provides a sub-set of the capabilities of the
Client Module.
Primavera P6 is fully compatible with several enterprise applications, including those offered by BEA
Systems, Siebel, PeopleSoft, Oracle, and SAP. Primavera P6 also interfaces with Microsoft Project.
Integration (portfolio) management – P6 Portfolio Management provides advanced what-if scenario
modeling, capacity analysis, tabular scorecards, rich graphics, and optimization functionality.
Configurable scorecards, graphical views, and user dashboards monitor the performance of each project
in the portfolio. Information is conveyed to decision makers through interactive graphs and charts,
ensuring the portfolio of projects and programs is aligned with strategic objectives.
Time management – The project lifecycle from Project Initiation to Project Closeout is managed by the
P6 Planner / Scheduler. The P6 Planner / Scheduler provides multi-user, multi-project functionality, with
scheduling and resource control capabilities, support for multi-tiered project hierarchies, resource
scheduling, capturing of actual data, customizable views, and the ability to extend functionality based on
user-definable data. Data is exchanged seamlessly with Microsoft Project.
Scope management –Scope planning, scope definition, and WBS creation are provided by the P6
Planner / Scheduler.
Cost management –Primavera P6 provides cost estimating, cost budgeting, and cost control through the
P6 Cost Manager. The P6 Cost Manager integrates detailed cost information with the program schedule
in a single solution. It combines project performance data from cost systems (like enterprise resource
planning or account systems) and Primavera schedule data, adds complex burdening rates, and tracks
committed costs. The P6 Cost Manager provides Earned Value and Estimate at Completion tools that
systematically determine if projects are ahead of schedule, behind schedule, over budget, or under
budget by analyzing key performance indicators (KPIs).
Quality management – Although Primavera P6 provides a means for planning quality assurance and
quality control, no explicit features for quality management are provided.
Human Resource management The Primavera P6 Resource Manager supports the resource request
and staffing process, from both a top-down planning and a bottom-up assignment perspective, giving
project managers and resource managers a platform to easily communicate their requirements and
decisions throughout the entire project lifecycle. The Resource Proficiency Manager assigns and
manages primary role capabilities and proficiency levels, as well as an unlimited number of secondary
role capabilities and proficiency levels.
Communication management – Team members can use the P6 Communication Center to collaborate
and share information. The collaborative features included with Primavera P6 automatically escalate any
decisions made by the project team to management to keep upper-level personnel advised. It also
includes a central document repository and a centralized calendar with information about all major
milestones. Project managers can store information about all potential team members and then
automatically match skill sets against project requirements. Primavera P6 also has a Broadcast News
function which allows team members to send project-related messages to everyone on the team.
Risk management – Primavera P6 provides a means for documenting and managing project risks and
issues; however, qualitative and quantitative risk analysis, such as using Monte Carlo simulation and
“what-if” scenarios, are only provided with the addition of the Primavera Pertmaster full lifecycle risk
analytics solution.
Procurement management – Although Primavera P6 provides a means for planning purchases,
acquisitions, and contracting, no explicit features for procurement management are provided.
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
Strengths
• With Primavera's acquisition of ProSight, it gains application portfolio management (APM)
functionality and improved entrance into IT organizations (particularly in government), as
Primavera leverages financial strength to continue to pursue multiple PPM market segments
(including IT and professional services, as well as energy and its home base in engineering and
construction).
• Primavera demonstrates a long-standing dedication to the development of effective tools for
enterprise project scheduling and execution differentiated by capabilities that address qualitative
and quantitative risk management at various levels, including via the risk management
component from its recent acquisition of Pertmaster.
• Customers cite service and support as strong points of their relationships with Primavera as a
software provider.
Cautions
• Customers say that analyzing project management data in different ways for IT resource
management is weak, although this is projected to improve in upcoming software versions.
• With the robust nature of Primavera P6 comes a steep learning curve for end users.
• Primavera does not offer ancillary products, native functionality or strong integration points
supporting IT service management (ITSM) or application lifecycle management (ALM) areas of IT
work management.
Microsoft EPM 2007
Microsoft Project Professional 2007 is a desktop-based application, while the Microsoft Enterprise Project
Management (EPM) Solution resides on the following servers from the Microsoft Office Project 2007
family, providing an end-to-end PPM solution:
• Microsoft Office Project Server 2007
• Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server 2007
Since Project is a Microsoft application, it easily integrates with other Office applications. Additionally, it
can integrate with other enterprise applications, like Siebel, PeopleSoft, and SAP.
Integration (portfolio) management – Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server provides visibility and
insight to enhance decision-making through custom views (such as dashboards or scorecards) and
predefined and custom reports. Transparency across all projects, programs, and application portfolios
provides objective prioritization, optimization, and selection that align the project portfolio with business
strategy, maximizing return on investment. Key performance indicators (KPIs) that proactively predict
cost, resource, and schedule overruns assist with deciding which projects, programs, and initiatives to
fund, which to sustain, and which to terminate.
Time management – Activity definition and sequencing as well as resource estimating are all provided
by Microsoft Office Project Professional. Project schedules can be created from a generous assortment
of templates, by importing task lists, or by building from scratch. Microsoft Office Project Professional
2007 provides robust project management tools for managing deliverable activity timelines and deadlines
for programs, tasks, and assignments.
Scope management – Scope planning, scope definition, and WBS creation are provided by Microsoft
Office Project Professional, as well as scope verification and control. Microsoft Office Project
Professional also provides preliminary requirements planning, including definition of project deliverables.
Cost management – The Microsoft EPM Solution provides cost estimating, cost budgeting, and cost
control through Microsoft Office Project Professional and Project server. Earned value calculations,
including Schedule Performance Index (SPI), To Complete Performance Index (TCPI), Cost Performance
Index (CPI), Cost Variance Percentage (CV%), and Schedule Variance Percentage (SV%), use original
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cost estimates saved with a baseline and actual work to date to show whether the actual costs incurred
are on budget.
Quality management – Although the Microsoft EPM Solution provides a means for planning quality
assurance and quality control, no explicit features for quality management are provided.
Human Resource management – Microsoft Office Project Professional and Project Server manage the
allocation of available personnel using a resource profile repository called the Enterprise Resource Pool.
A Build Team feature supports the matching of resources from the Enterprise Resource Pool with
characteristics specified in the project for the type of resource, the required skill level, and other qualifiers.
Quick resource searches and assignments to projects can be performed using a Web-based version of
Build Team from Enterprise.
Communication management – Using the Microsoft EPM Solution, team members can collaborate via
an extranet, intranet, or the Internet. Project Managers can post data in real time on the Internet, and
team members can view information and send updates through the Internet or Microsoft Outlook.
Managers can use an online tool to establish a central repository for important documents. The Microsoft
EPM Solution has the ability to push critical data out to team members through the Internet.
Risk management – Risks are associated with tasks and projects, probability and impact are specified,
and ownership is assigned with Microsoft Office Project Server. Risk tracking requires Microsoft Windows
SharePoint Services 3.0. Advanced risk analysis using Monte Carlo simulation to replace uncertain
values like costs, durations, and dates in project plans with a distribution of possible outcomes and how
likely they are to occur is provided by purchasing add-ins such as Palisade’s @RISK for Project or Intaver
Institute’s RiskyProject. Risk across the portfolio is analyzed with Microsoft Office Project Portfolio Server
2007, ensuring the right mix of projects is selected by balancing risk tolerance with profit maximization.
Procurement management – Although the Microsoft EPM Solution provides a means for planning
purchases, acquisitions, and contracting, no explicit features for procurement management are provided.
Strengths
• Widespread yet varied levels of use and standardization of Microsoft Project for project
scheduling gives Microsoft immediate entrance into many potential PPM accounts, as will the
Web interface introduced in the 2007 version of the Enterprise Project Management (EPM)
solution. An extensive partner network extends Microsoft EPM and creates sales opportunities.
• The available integrations of the Microsoft EPM solution with Microsoft Office, SharePoint and
Visual Studio Team System installed in many potential PPM accounts enable additional project
collaboration possibilities, connecting knowledge workers and the tools they use every day to the
PPM activities tracked in EPM.
• Through its companion Office Project Portfolio Server product, EPM supports APM by providing
best-practice methodologies, and analytic tools support decisions such as continued application
investment or application retirement.
Cautions
• Microsoft's EPM, which is less customized out of the box, as compared with other PPM offerings,
demonstrates more dependence than the competition on service and support partnerships.
• To use the full EPM system, customers generally must integrate it with and adopt other Microsoft
products and technologies. Some requirements may add to the long-term total administration
costs of the Microsoft EPM system.
• There remains a reliance on Microsoft Project Professional for many project-scheduling and
project-tracking functions in Microsoft EPM, which may not be suitable for all project
environments, although users increasingly can opt for the new Web interface to start and interact
with projects.
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
Summary
As reflected in Figure 1 Functionality Without Add-ins, these three Leaders in the Gartner 2008 Magic
Quadrant for IT Project and Portfolio Management stand on a relatively level footing. With the purchase
of additional add-ins, all three applications provide robust capabilities for collectively managing IT projects
in a way that is efficient and works toward strategic business objectives.
Figure 1 Functionality Without Add-ins
The CA Clarity Risk and Controls Manager provides one notable exception: only CA Clarity provides
explicit features for quality management beyond a means for simply planning quality assurance and
quality control. Neither Primavera P6 nor the Microsoft EPM Solution offer this functionality or add-ins
that provide it.
7467 Ridge Road, Suite 330 • Hanover, MD 21076 • Phone (410) 993-1699 • http://www.ProObject.com/
