Project Portfolio Management: A View From The Management Trenches

10.1. PPM'S SEVEN PS

We developed this simple mnemonic as an outline and affirmation of PPM design principles to encourage one another and ourselves. The seven Ps refer to the first letter of key design principles we discovered that when used together make PPM work. The Ps are Passion, People, Politics, Process, Potential, Performance, and Payback. Let's look at each one in turn.

P¹ = Passion

We all share a real passion for the subject of PPM. This passion is what keeps the design alive within us, especially when things may not go as smoothly as we might hope.

Let's go back to the good old dictionary to gain a better understanding of what we mean by passion. We use passion along the specific definition Merriam-Webster describes as "a strong liking or desire for or devotion to some activity, object, or concept."

We have found that many of us have our business experience rooted in the discipline of project management. From that base we each moved on to take in the best from other disciplines, including program management, systems engineering, configuration management, financial investment, operations management, and enterprise architecture. Our journey found us each yearning for something more. We sought a better way to put the best of these disciplines together to more effectively and efficiently run our businesses. We each gravitated into the emerging discipline based on a more than half-century-old financial concept applied to the management of projects and programs.

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