The ServiceNow Project Portfolio Management (PPM) module which was introduced with the Summer 2008 release and developed further since then can now be considered as a serious competitor to any other project management tool.
Business Management suite of ServiceNow contains: Portfolio, Project, Demand, Test Management, Agile Development (SDLC) and Resource Management. Besides the ServiceNow platform flexibility and scalability, PPM has the ability to reconcile Innovation, Operation & Finance.
How is project work currently done in organizations?
In many organizations projects are executed using emails, documents and spreadsheets. There is no unique repository and information is spread in mailboxes, shared folders or sites. Project data might be poor in terms of quality and consistency which makes it hard for PMOs and/or CIOs to take the adequate decisions at the right time.
Besides, teams like operations, development and other actors usually use their own tools respectively. Consequently, for the project manager it is labor-intensive to gather, double check, and consolidate information from so many different sources and accesses. The use of different tools makes it hard to have a general overview and the coordination of different teams is performed via emails or spreadsheets.
As a result, it makes it difficult for CIO-Level to know the status of projects or if resources are focusing on the right things. Ultimately, when problems emerge within a project (over budget, time, scope, etc) it falls into the PMO & CEO radar when it is already too late.
Why you should use ServiceNow for project management
First of all, ServiceNow can host Operation & Innovation Teams (PPM Suite) which means having one common tool. It helps to assign tasks with deadlines to resources (operations teams or even vendors), see the progress of projects (percentage complete), it has the ability to implement automatic reminders and escalation, as well as the capacity to reflect decisions and issues maintaining all stakeholders in the loop. This eases the project manager’s life in terms of follow-up as overdue tasks are available in one place (Single System of Truth). In addition, Accurate reports are available in real time (always under the premise that users update the data).
ServiceNow PPM module can be easily configured in order to embrace the project methodology in place (PMI, PRINCE or Hermes). It makes the project manager’s life easier as the methodology (Phases, Key task expectations, Milestones, etc ..) is documented within the tool itself.
The great advantages of Demand Management
In this context, it is also worth to mention Demand Management. Actually, this process is meant to capture all ideas, needs, requests from the business in one place. The advantage is that the business does not feel anymore that their demands fall into some sort of black hole but are collected and taken seriously. The aim here is to define a common process to evaluate demands concerning added value, risks, prerequisites, etc according to the type of Demand, Portfolio, Service, etc. Once all stakeholders have given their opinion the system offers a Bubble Chart that visualizes nicely the evaluation of different demands.
![demandmanagement]()
The green bubbles show which points are Big Value and Low risk, the red ones the opposite. Beyond it is always possible to define own dimensions. The outputs of a demand can be: Projects, Change Request or Defects. One other purpose of Demand Management is to involve Operation from the very beginning, as they usually complain that they are informed too late (architecture is not in place, missing skills, etc.)
Besides the possibility of reducing the number of tools, the main advantage of using ServiceNow for Project Management is to centralize projects in one place as single system of truth with all demands, developments, projects, milestones and financial aspects. Instead of spending time chasing statuses and wasting time trying with difficulty to approximately consolidating data and highlight relevant information, using ServiceNow reunites all this in one common tool. It will help you gain full visibility of everything ongoing within a project: late projects, pending/late tasks or pending/achieved risks, issues, decisions, traffic light, automate alerts like reminders for overdue tasks and many more.
Say goodbye to nontransparent, chaotic projects, say hello to ServiceNow for Project Management.
The post Why you should use ServiceNow for Project Management appeared first on Fruition Partners - ServiceNow Gold Partner.
