PMO Conference & Professional Development Day

       International Institute of Project Management (IIPM), Chennai hosted the first ever conference in India on the Industry's hot topic "PMO in IT Industry: The Relevance & Challenges" on 9th Dec'07 at Hotel Quality Inn Sabari, T.Nagar. It was also an occasion for conducting the  "Professional Development Day" for the practicing the Project managers, Consultants, Trainers, and PM Professionals from all industries.

       The conference provided an excellent opportunity to create awareness about the growing need of setting up of PMO unit in all project-based companies across the length and breadth of the Indian sub-continent. 

    Initially, Mr. Shiva,Admin Executive, IIPM welcomed the speakers, panelist and the attendees.

   The conference formally opened with the inaugural address by Mr.O.Arivazhagan, B.E (Hons), PMP, SSBB, CEO, IIPM on the conference main theme "PMO in IT Industry: The Relevance & Challenges". In his inaugural address, Mr.Arivazhagan explained the concepts of PMO and its relevance to the IT industry by drawing parallels from construction industry. He drew the attention of all the participants by asking
10-questions to check the relevance of PMO to IT industry. It was so interesting and thought-provoking that the participants answered "yes" to almost all the questions in unison with great enthusiasm thereby acknowledging the need and relevance of PMO in IT industry.

       Mr. Ari kept the audience's interest live and kept open answers to the second half of the conference theme i.e "The Challenges" till the end of the conference so that the conference participants could take home the challenges that were required to be tamed by the industry professionals when they setup a PMO in their organizations. This created lots of curiosity amongst the conference attendees and prompted the forthcoming Speakers and Panelists to come out with the challenges they faced to augment Mr. Ari's list of challenges.

     The following speakers spoke on the conference theme covering various areas/phases of setting up a PMO in IT industry.        

•  Mr. Abiraman, BE, MBA, PMO Analyst, Polaris Software Lab Ltd,
           Topic – PMO: Roles &Responsibilities

•  Mr. Dipanker Das, M.Tech, PMP, SSGB, Project Manager, CGN IT.
           Topic – PMO: Implementation Experiences- A Case study

• Mr. Tony Jacob, B.Tech, PMP, PGD (CM), Operational Consultant,
  Aconex India, Chair – Professional Development, DPC-SIG, USA
           Topic – PMO in Construction through Online Collaboration- A Case study

• Mr M. Sakthi Vel –Dy.Manager – State Bank of India
           Topic – PMO: Which Organizational Structure is best suited?

• Mr. Lakshmi Narayanan, MBA, PMP, Associate Manager-Delivery, Virtusa India,
           Topic – PMO: Roles &Responsibilities

• Mr.Dhanesh Kunar, MBA, PMP,Project Manager,WIPRO
           Topic – PMO: Which Organizational Structure is best suited?

• Mr. Ramakrishnan, Former GM, CGL
           Topic – PMO: Implementation experiences: A case study
   

   After a sumptuous lunch,  there was a lively and highly interactive panel discussion on the main theme of the conference,  "PMO in IT Industry: The Relevance & Challenges". The following SMEs, practicing professionals, and consultants took part in the panel discussion that was well moderated by Mr. Ari with his usual punching and humorous quotes from his professional career spanning 23 years of project/project management experience in various industries and countries.

• Panelist 1: Mr. Ravichandran, MBA, CEO, Indus CyberTech
  Panelist 2: Ms. Gayathri Balaswamy, MBA, PMP, Vice-President,
                 M&A Integration, ISG Nova Soft
  Panelist 3: Mr. Jawahar Venkatraman, Project Manager, PMP
  Panelist 4: Mr. Ajit Kumar , MCA,MS,PMP, Delivery Manager, Logica CMG
  Panelist 5: Mr. Ashok Sharma , ICWA,ACS,PMP, SAP Project Manager,
                 SEAL InfoT
  Panelist 6: Ms. V.S.Srividhya, MCA, PMP,
                                             Senior Project Manager, INFOSYS Technologies Limited.
                                     Panel Moderator: Mr. O.Arivazhagan, B.E (Honors), PMP, SSBB, CEO, IIPM

   After a vivid and highly interactive discussion by panelists and the participants,  with interesting comments from the moderator, for nearly 2-hours on various challenges being currently faced by industry professionals, Mr. Ari, the panel discussion moderator, narrated in the end the TOP 10 Challenges that any PMO team should prepare itself to address while setting up a PMO in IT industry.

    IIPM awarded all those who scored above 75% in the PMP exam in the year 2006-2007.

   All the participants were distributed professional development certificate for 7 PDUs.

   The conference came to an end with the vote of thanks by Mr. Sai Prasad, Cognizant Technology Solutions.

     In the evening, IIPM hosted a cocktail dinner party to all IIPM alumni wherein the PM professionals networked and exchanged their views on current trends in the industry. IIPM thanked the sponsor of the cocktail dinner, International Dream Merchants (IDM) whose Digital movie trailer of the forthcoming digital film "The Perfect Knot" was screened to the amusement & enjoyment of the audience. The conference attendees were thrilled to see the trailer of the digital film which was, as informed by Mr. Ari, managed as a project in the film industry using corporate principles and many project management tools & techniques from PMI's PMBOK Guide.

       Last but not the least, IIPM also displayed yet another face of responsible corporate companies by soliciting donations from the participants to encourage social responsibility from amongst the PM professionals to help the needy.

        IIPM, on behalf of the PM community, extends special thanks to the following project managers who generously donated in response to IIPM's call for helping the charity institutions.

          1. O.Arivazhagan, PMP (PC System)
          2. Namagiri Lakshmi, PMP (PC System)
          3. Padmalakshmi, PMP (Household Items, Dress Materials)
          4. K.S.Prashant Kumar, PMP (Dress Materials) 
          5. Sreekumar (Study Materials)

PMO Conference - Feedback
 

PMO Conference Additional Pictures

PMO Conference - Feedback

• I can't thank you enough for organizing the PMO conference. In fact, I feel it's like I took 1-week class room training on PMO, with different perspectives and practical examples. Thanks again, Ari.
                                                      Seyed Ibrahim, PMP, Project Manager.
   

• It was a good opportunity to meet like minded people in the industry & to learn from experts.
  Thank you so much, Ari.                 V.S.Srividhya, PMP, Senior Project Manager, INFOSYS Technologies Ltd
   

• I was new to PMO before this session, but I gained a lot of information about how to implement, and challenges faced in its implementation. Will attend more such sessions from IIPM
                                                       B.Sai Prasad, Senior Associate - Project, Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTS)
   

• Overall it has been good experience knowing all the relevance & challenges of a PMO in IT industry, which is yet considered evolving in India. Being a PMO Manager dealt with all the 7 challenges presented by Mr. Ari but its relevance in Indian IT Industry was very helpful. Thank you, Ari.
                                                       R.Harish, Manager - Project Budget & planning, Alcatel - Lucent Development     
   

• The discussions were really thought provoking. The presentations were very good. The session helped understand different PMO roles, responsibilities & challenges.  Vaidhyanathan, Project Manager, POLARIS Software
   

• Good Plan & Great execution. Interesting presentations & knowledge sharing. Good mix of participation (panelist, Speakers&audience). Great Topic, which has created many more topics for discussion.
                                                       Dipanker Das,PMP, Project Manager, CGN IT Services Pvt.Ltd
   

• The program (conference) was well organized. Ari moderated the panel discussion very well. Most presentations made a story case for PMO in IT industry. PMO is still in a state of evolving . Seminar like this will certainly help meeting of minds & shape opinions.                         V.Karthikeyan, Manager - Projects, RAMCO Systems
   

• PMO concept was understood. However, care needs to ensure that the same information is not repeated. Good Topic to be discussed but needs to be implemented to reap the benefits out of it.
                                                      E.T.Anitha, Project Head, Inautix Technologies India Pvt Ltd
   

• Good to have similar programs. It has given good understanding and helps to understand the views of fellow PMs in various industries. Thanks for organizing this program.
                                                      R.Karthikeyan, PMP, Project Lead, Inautix Technologies India Pvt Ltd
   

• This discussion was very good. It was very informative. Overall it was very good.
                                                      Mahindar Singh, PMP, Location Manager, Godrej Global Solution Ltd
   

• Good. Overall it was good.           Sathya Narayanan, Project Manager, HCL
   

• In fact, we planned to implement PMO within our vertical and I hope this would definitely help us in reaping the benefits in many aspects. This session is really enlightened the pros & cons of implementing PMO.
                                                      Sathiakumar Ramachandran, Assistant Manager - Projects,Cognizant Tech.Pvt.Ltd
   

• I have refreshed on PMBOK Practices. Very Good. Participants interacted very well.
                                                       Umapathy, Chief Manager, IndusInd Information Tech Ltd
   

• Was Informative and a few points were thought-provoking. Will try and implement at work. Overall it was a productive and good session.        K.S. Prashant Kumar, PMP, Assistant Manager - Projects, Servion Global.
   

• It is very useful and Interactive session right from the start to the end. All the speakers made the participants involve in the session. Very good program.  G.Karthikeyan, Senior Lecturer, S.M.K Fomra Institute of Technology
   

• Inputs from the speakers and panel discussion were very useful. The conference was quite good.
                                                       Srinivasan Dasarathi, Executive Director, Zunotech Infosystem Pvt Ltd