What is a program in an organization?

Program management software is a tool that helps collectively drive efficiency across all your projects. It helps program managers to plan, manage, track and report on progress and performance in their programs— and provides total transparency into that process.

ProjectManager is an award-winning project management tool that assists in organizing projects and programs with cloud-based features to make data-driven decisions. Here’s how it works.

1. Create Your Program

A program is made up of multiple projects. The first step in any project management program is to collect all related projects that work together as a program.

Import the projects in your program into our software from task lists, or use one of our industry-specific templates to create the project from scratch.

2. Set High-Level View

Not all programs are the same. You need a tool that will adapt to your way of working and not make you fit into its rigid structure.

Customize your program to show the only data you need for your decision-making process. Status bars by each project show progress, cost/budget and more. Profile pictures or avatars for managers and teams allow for rapid insight on who is assigned to a certain project.

3. Group & Filter Projects

Programs are groups of similar projects synergizing with each other in ways that enhance the overall value of each individual project. That doesn’t mean, however, that programs are singular in nature. In fact, organizations often have many to manage in their project portfolio.

Add projects to folders to create program groups. Title and filter these groups, then monitor their performance with our program dashboards that collect real-time data.

4. Set up Notifications

Staying on top of progress and changes is key to reaching the program goals. Getting notifications in a timely manner ensures that they won’t get lost in the shuffle, and lets a program manager stay informed and in control.

Get updates both by email alerts and in-app notifications. Manage emails to alert you of comments, updates and more. The bell icon on our tool gathers your notifications in one place.

5. Balance Resources

Keeping your resources matched to the capacity of your program is one way to maximize performance. That includes your team members!

Manage the resources in your programs from our color-coded Overview Workload page. See at a glance who on your team is overallocated, and balance their workload right from the page to boost productivity.

6. Keep Track of Program

Programs are designed to help individual projects work together and achieve greater efficiency. Therefore, you need to see how all the projects in your program interact.

Use the Roadmap feature to view all the projects in your program on a single timeline. View the start and end dates for each to ensure there are no bottlenecks, and even drill down to the task level for each project.

7. Report to Stakeholders

Transparency is important when dealing with stakeholders. If they feel out of the loop, they’re going to interfere with the management of the program. ProjectManager helps you execute your communications plan.

Keep you stakeholders informed with one-click reports. You can filter the data to show just what they want about status, various and more, then share as a PDF or print out.

What’s the Difference Between a Program Manager and a Project Manager

Even though they’re both project management roles, they’re not interchangeable. As we’ve mentioned above, a program and a project are two completely different things, and that’s why the responsibilities of a program manager differ from those of a project manager.

A program management certificate differentiates program managers from project managers, project coordinators and project portfolio management professionals. For example, the project management institute (PMI) issues the Program Management Professional (PgMP) certification that’s exclusive for program managers.

Program Management Certification

The Project Management Institute (PMI) offers a Program Management Professional (PgMP) certification. To even qualify for this program, you have to have a secondary degree, plus 6,000 hours of project management experience and 10,500 hours of program management training. For program managers with a four-year degree, however, it only takes a little bit of program management experience plus 6,000 hours of project management experience.

Getting a program management certificate from the PMI shows that you’re serious about program management and that you not only have the experience needed to rise to the top of a resume pile but also have the actual program management training it takes to make projects successful on a company-wide level.

Program Manager vs Project Manager

The qualities of a great program manager include being more diplomatic and strategic than their project manager counterparts in an effort to manage stakeholders, project managers and team members with varying project goals. To achieve program goals, they have to interact with many cross functional teams, and align all their projects with the program plan.

This differs from a project manager in that project managers are required to be detail-oriented and great with numbers, with an eye for hyper-efficiency to keep individual projects on track, but are not necessarily expected to be diplomatic, and don’t need to communicate with as many people as program managers.

Additionally, program managers are big picture thinkers who must understand the strategic management thinking behind the development of a program plan. In other words, they must be able to align their programs with the strategic vision and strategic plans of their organizations. To do so, they have to begin by creating the program plan and program governance.

Once the planning is done they have to oversee execution, control the program and collaborate with project managers and stakeholders. On the flip side, project managers are not necessarily worried about big picture goals of their organization. Their only goal is to oversee the planning, scheduling and execution of their projects.

Unique challenges that many program managers face include:

• Creating a program plan and project governance model to manage multiple projects at once
• Keeping all project managers and projects aligned on the singular big picture business objectives
• Managing stakeholders expectations and ensuring that all project members are on board
• Verifying that all budgets and resources are available at multiple points throughout the program

Whereas project managers face the unique challenges of:

• Managing the detailed elements of a single project
• Tracking, quantifying and reporting on the specific ups and downs of their project status
• Allocating resources, budget, dependencies, time and tasks—while mapping them out within a given project scope
• Planning, budgeting, monitoring and reporting on the progress of their project

There are also portfolio managers, who are different from both project managers and program managers in that they deal with choosing, prioritizing and ensuring that all projects and programs make sense for the company’s objectives. Additionally, they are focused on getting the most value for the money it takes to roll out a project by using thorough research to identify the correct time and place for the rollout.

Program Management Industries and Roles

Since program managers are similar to change agents, there can be many roles to fulfill at one time, including planning coordinator and senior user. They need to have the people skills to be able to be an effective communicator and leader, but at the same time need the analytical skills to objectively view and report on their projects’ successes.

Many program managers are located in Silicon Valley, Washington D.C. and Chicago, IL as many program managers work in IT companies, the tech industry, construction management, the engineering industry and others.

How ProjectManager Helps with Program Management

ProjectManager has everything you need to manage projects, programs, stakeholders and team members. Our cloud-based tool gives you access to Gantt charts that let you create dependencies across tasks in different projects in your program.

You can also have automated reporting that lets you track portfolio status, project status, workload and more. Our workload features even allow you to track how your team is being best utilized within the different projects in your program.

Program management is a deeply involved, high-level practice that includes one individual or a team of program managers overseeing multiple projects. Without proper tools in place to manage all of the projects and portfolios at once, important tasks can slip through the cracks. Start a free 30-day trial of ProjectManager today and get award-winning program management tools to make your life easier.

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