Balfour Beatty – Workplace
The challenge
Balfour Beatty Workplace (BBW) was winning an unprecedented number of new facilities management delivery contracts, and at the same time was undertaking critical internal investment programmes and projects. However, it became clear that there was not the internal capacity nor skills to deliver these demands to time, within cost and to the quality required. This was significantly impacting business performance, profitability and the delivery of programme/project benefits. Additionally, as the business had been operating in a federated way for a number of years, there was resistance to the implementation of centralised oversight and the associated governance processes.
The result
Following a review of the maturity level (using P3M3) and the business value of the existing ePMO, a revised governance and delivery model was developed and implemented. A significant change of behaviour was achieved at senior executive level, which enabled individuals across the business to make the transition needed. This ensured that the ownership of delivery remained with the business divisions, but that the Executive Board had visibility across the whole portfolio.
All programmes and projects were re-baselined creating a revised delivery portfolio with revalidated benefits. Restructuring of the existing ePMO brought together all existing programme and project management resource from across the business, generating cost savings and achieving major improvements to project delivery. In addition, once implemented, the standardised governance and reporting was able to highlight systemic issues that needed addressing – and where best practice could be shared.
What made it successful
- There was a really clear business driver – to ensure that new contracts were able to reach their target margin within agreed timescales, thus reducing any adverse impact on overall business performance and profit
- It was recognised very early on that the ePMO function needed to move up the value chain – from being “administrative” to being “strategic” and able to support the emerging needs of the business and the Executive Board
- We were able to bring deep specialist expertise and insight in portfolio management and assurance
- There was an agreed focus on ensuring that the business had an effective in-house ePMO and one of the Ignite team members led the team on an interim basis. Part of this role was to support the development of existing members of the team, and the recruitment of a new ePMO Manager
- The Ignite team worked collaboratively with the ePMO team and key stakeholders across the business – ensuring that all parties were kept informed on what was going to happen and that any barriers to delivery were addressed.