| | November 20149CIOReviewhave to be met since we are a dynamic company. Working with IT as business partners, we can find a solution to meet the need. · Control scope changes Scope changes can easily get out of control. IT PMs monitor and assess the impact of the change and ensure stakeholders approve and understand the impact.· Manage risk Acknowledging risk and creating contingency plans is a crucial role of the project manager, which saves the company time and money.· Manage communication at project launch IT PMs are the center of correspondence to essential department members. They communicate all updates, status meetings, risks, change of scope, and any other critical information in a timely manner. They also store project documents in a central repository for all project team members to access.· Involve stakeholders It is critical to involve stakeholders in the project and review progress. IT PMs are essential in managing project expectations.Aside from those mentioned, we've seen additional benefits to utilizing IT PMs. IT project managers are able to focus their attention on the planning and execution of the entire project and leave the programming to IT. This frees up the IT management team to concentrate on their tasks for the project rather than focusing on the overall execution of the project.And because project managers report to the Project Management department and not IT, we are able to continually improve our processes, modify processes for our environment, discuss lessons learned and share new practices and methodologies. It also prevents us from being influenced by or showing favoritism to one group, since our department is neutral.I would encourage every company to consider adding an IT PM team to your organization. We have been able to build greater communication and trust, which has been crucial to our success in achieving common goals. We truly work as business partners so the communication is transparent and flows freely.In addition, we have reduced risks, cutcosts and improved success rates overall. Not only has our Project Management team quickly become valuable players in all projects across the business--particularly IT--but it has also become the communication hub of the entire company."I would encourage every company to consider adding an IT PM team to your organization
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