PMO Strategies

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

PMO leaders are usually excellent at addition. A stakeholder needs better visibility, so we add a dashboard. Projects are struggling, so we add governance. Adoption is weak, so we add training, communication, and another control.

Every addition may be defensible. Together, they can leave your team spread across too many unfinished services while executives are still waiting for something to get better.

In this episode, I’m taking you through the PMO math problem that keeps capable leaders busy without creating enough visible value. We’ll look at why the organization’s ability to absorb change matters just as much as your team’s capacity, and why subtraction is a leadership decision rather than a retreat.

🔹 How the addition trap erodes adoption and executive trust

🔹 What to subtract without abandoning important commitments

🔹 Why one root-cause-focused MVP can solve more than several partial services

🔹 How a finished result creates champions who help multiply your IMPACT

Press play to learn how to focus your PMO on the right business problem, deliver measurable value sooner, and build support for what comes next.

P.S. Ready to stop piecing together the answer? Join me live for the IMPACT Engine Practitioner Certification Program on December 2, 4, 9, and 11. During these live, virtual half-day sessions, we will work through all six stages of the IMPACT Engine and practice making the focused decisions your organization needs. Explore IMPACT Engine Practitioner. Enrollment closes November 20, 2026.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

You can have a strong strategy, a solid plan, and all the right tracking in place and still watch delivery slow down because the people doing the work are not truly engaged.

That is where this conversation with Ian Watts gets interesting for PMO and transformation leaders. We talk about what happens when the stakeholder problem you keep trying to solve is actually a broader people problem inside the organization.

Ian is the founder of SB Dream Coach and Employee Success Group, and his work focuses on helping organizations connect people, purpose, and performance. In this episode, we explore what real commitment looks like beyond surveys, perks, and surface-level engagement.

🔹 Why disengagement can show up as a strategy-delivery problem

🔹 How to tell the difference between a PMO engagement issue and a wider organizational issue

🔹 Why knowing what matters to people changes the way they show up

🔹 How to approach team members and stakeholders differently while keeping the same human-centered intent

Press play to rethink the people side of strategy delivery and what it takes to create commitment that lasts.

Connect with Ian Watts

LinkedIn

Website

P.S. People are more likely to engage when they understand why the work matters. Your executives are no different. In my FREE training, Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO, I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems, outcomes, and 90-day progress leaders care about so you can make a stronger case for the support you need. Register for the free live workshop.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

You can be surrounded by people all day and still feel like you are leading alone.

Your team needs confidence from you. Your executives expect a recommendation. Your peers may be part of the tension you are trying to work through. So you keep turning the problem over in your own head, reading more, working harder, and trying to find the answer before anyone realizes you are not sure what to do next.

That independence probably helped you become the leader who could walk into a mess and figure it out. But as your role grows, trying to solve everything alone can limit you to the questions, experiences, and patterns you already have.

In this episode, I’m showing you what the right room can do for your leadership and how to tell whether the rooms you are in are actually making you stronger.

🔹 Why validation without challenge can leave you just as stuck as when you walked in

🔹 How a better question can move you from process thinking to the real business problem

🔹 What to look for in peers, coaches, communities, and leadership rooms

🔹 Why getting into the room is only the beginning

Press play to find the rooms that expand your thinking and help you lead the work differently when you go back inside your organization.

P.S. If you know what needs to change but need executive funding, authority, resources, or support to build or strengthen your PMO, join the FREE virtual training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect your PMO to the business problems executives already care about and make your case in language they can understand.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

AI activity is spreading across organizations faster than many leaders can see what it is costing, where it fits, or whether it is creating business value.

That is exactly why I believe this moment matters for PMO and transformation leaders.

In this episode, I’m joined by Cedric Fiederer to explore what happens when AI stops being a collection of experiments and starts becoming a real enterprise portfolio of investments, tradeoffs, risks, and strategic choices.

We get into the questions executives are increasingly going to ask, especially when AI funding starts competing with ERP upgrades, growth investments, capacity, and everything else already in the portfolio.

🔹 Why fragmented AI activity is becoming an enterprise decision problem

🔹 How the PMO can create visibility without building a giant layer of red tape

🔹 What leaders need to know about value, compliance, workforce risk, and tradeoffs

🔹 Where to start if nobody currently owns the enterprise picture

If your PMO has felt a little outside the AI conversation, this is the opportunity I do not want you to miss.

Press play to see how the PMO can help turn AI activity into strategic value.

Connect with Cedric Fiederer

Follow Cedric on LinkedIn

Learn More About Planview

P.S. Want to go deeper on this exact challenge? Join me and Rod Hughes, VP of Transformation at Planview, for From AI Activity to Enterprise IMPACT: The PMO’s New Role in AI Transformation on Thursday, October 29 at 10am CT / 4pm GMT. We’ll explore how PMOs can create visibility into AI investments, help leaders decide what to fund, stop, scale, or rethink, and connect those choices to measurable business outcomes.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

How many times have you told yourself, “I’m not ready yet”?

Not ready to have the executive conversation. Not ready to apply for the role. Not ready to build the PMO differently. Not ready to get the training or support because you need to figure a few more things out first.

I understand that instinct because I lived it. I did not become a confident speaker and then step onto a stage. I said yes while I was scared, prepared responsibly, practiced with people who could help me, paid attention to what worked, and did it again.

That order matters for PMO and transformation leaders because the confidence, judgment, and skill you are waiting for are often built through the work itself. And if something is already not working, waiting can cost more than time.

• How to tell the difference between responsible preparation and hiding
• Why discomfort is not proof that you should wait
• What real practice gives you that private preparation cannot
• Why waiting too long can change how executives see your PMO

Press play to hear why the work is what makes you ready, and how to take the next responsible step before the organization makes the decision for you.

P.S. If the conversation you don’t feel ready for is the one where you need to make the case for your PMO, join my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO.

You’ll learn how to connect your PMO to the business problems executives care about, define credible 90-day wins, and make a stronger ask for the support you need.

Join the free training.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

AI is creating more ideas, more experiments, and more pressure to move than most PMO processes were designed to absorb.

That does not mean your PMO needs a bigger gate. It means the way you connect strategy, intake, prioritization, capacity, and learning has to change.

In this episode, I’m joined by Marc Chabot, Co-founder and CEO of ForceEquals, to explore what AI changes across the strategy lifecycle and why this may be one of the biggest opportunities PMO and transformation leaders have had to step into the Strategy Navigator role.

🔹 Why strategy can no longer be treated as a once-a-year input to project planning

🔹 How AI can help mature rough ideas without forcing stakeholders through a heavy intake process

🔹 What changes when leaders can see projects, priorities, capacity, and strategy in the same decision context

🔹 Why AI guardrails, exceptions, and human-in-the-loop decisions can become signals for the next strategy conversation

Press play to hear how the PMO can use AI to remove friction, strengthen decisions, and help the organization turn strategy into measurable business IMPACT.

Connect with Marc Chabot

Follow Marc on LinkedIn

Learn more about ForceEquals

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

A few years ago, I was listening to PMO leaders compare the size of the portfolios they managed. $50 million. $100 million. $500 million. Billions.

Those numbers sound impressive, but they only tell me what the organization invested. The business question is what it got back.

That is the shift I want you to make in this episode. Thinking like a business owner means looking beyond activity, utilization, schedule, scope, and budget to the measurable outcome the work was funded to create. It also means being willing to make harder portfolio choices when too much work is slowing everything down.

🔹 Why a project can be green and still fail the business

🔹 The three questions that reconnect work to measurable business value

🔹 Why 100% resource utilization can actually destroy throughput and flow

🔹 How to bring leaders stronger choices about capacity, timing, cost, and expected value

Press play to hear how business-owner thinking changes the way you lead projects, portfolios, and the PMO.

P.S. If you need executive funding, authority, or resources to build or strengthen your PMO, the conversation cannot stay focused on headcount, tools, governance, or explaining what the PMO does. In my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO, I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case in a way they can understand and support. Register for the free training.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

If you are responsible for helping strategy become reality, you probably know this tension: the executive team wants the portfolio moving faster, but you cannot move work you cannot see.

Hidden departmental initiatives compete for the same people. Decisions wait for the next meeting. The same specialists become the bottleneck on every “top priority.” Then everyone calls it a resource problem.

In this episode, I’m joined by Paul Thompson, Founder and CEO of Metagyre, to get practical about what PMO and transformation leaders can do differently. We dig into the execution system underneath the project plans and what changes when you start managing the flow of work like a business leader.

🔹 Why “ruthless transparency” matters when hidden work is consuming capacity

🔹 How smaller, controlled releases can reduce risk and create momentum

🔹 Why the best meetings ratify decisions instead of beginning the debate

🔹 How to find the constraint that is actually setting the pace of the portfolio

Press play to hear how to move strategy forward with the people, capacity, and complexity you already have.

Connect with Paul

Follow Paul on LinkedIn

Get the Metagyre DIY Strategy Execution Eval Kit

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

You did the assessment. You designed the service around what people said they needed. You launched it, trained everyone, published the templates, and built the SharePoint page.

Then someone submits the old intake form. An executive bypasses the new prioritization process. The governance meeting becomes another status update, and you are left wondering why people are resisting the very thing they asked for.

I know how frustrating that feels. I also know the launch may not be where the problem started.

In this episode, I’m taking you into the space between “we launched it” and “this is how we work now.”

You’ll hear:

🔹 Why rollout activity can look successful while behavior stays exactly the same.

🔹 How to define adoption in language your stakeholders will recognize.

🔹 What early users can reveal about design, support, accountability, and friction.

🔹 How to reinforce a new habit when the old way feels faster.

Press play to learn how to give the PMO services you have already built a real chance to create the business value they were designed to deliver.

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

Some of the most expensive words I hear inside an organization are, “We’re waiting for more clarity.” Sometimes that is exactly the right call. The organization may be missing information it truly needs to act responsibly.

But sometimes “we need more information” is a hiding place. The team already has a recommendation, but nobody wants to own it. Every decision moves up the chain while strategy waits.

In this episode, I’m showing you how to separate a real information gap from false uncertainty and use one question to surface the thinking already in the room: “If you did know, what would you do?”

You will hear how this changes the PMO’s role, what executives need instead of another unresolved escalation, and how to create movement without confusing responsible action with reckless speed.

🔹 How to recognize when “we need more clarity” is masking decision avoidance

🔹 Why a recommendation builds more executive trust than an unresolved escalation

🔹 How to distinguish a reversible learning step from a decision that requires stronger evidence

🔹 The three questions that turn uncertainty into a responsible next move

🔹 Why creating clarity is strategic decision support, not project administration

Press play to learn how to help your team move forward without pretending the path is perfectly clear.

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

Organizations are moving quickly to deploy AI. But are they building the adaptability, judgment, and decision systems required to use it well, or repeating the same mistakes that weakened so many Agile transformations?

AI can analyze more data, generate more options, and move work faster. None of that guarantees the organization is asking the right question, assigning the decision to the right person, or protecting the human judgment it will need when the consequences rise.

In this episode, I am joined by Jim Highsmith, Agile Manifesto co-author and a pioneering voice in adaptive leadership, to connect the original purpose of Agile with the decisions organizations are making about AI right now.

Jim explains how Agile was designed to help organizations respond to uncertainty, why too many implementations became rigid and process-driven, and how the same pattern is beginning to appear in AI transformation. Together, we explore the shift from process-oriented management to judgment-oriented management and the role PMO and transformation leaders can play in designing stronger human-AI decision systems.

This is not a conversation about choosing the newest AI tool. It is about deciding what should be automated, where people must remain accountable, how judgment develops, and whether the organization is becoming more capable or simply producing more output.

When you press play, you will hear:

🔹 What Agile was created to solve and why its mindset became diluted as it spread.

🔹 Why doing Agile is not the same as building an adaptable organization.

🔹 How AI transformation can repeat the same process-over-mindset mistake at greater speed.

🔹 How to distinguish automation that removes activity from augmentation that strengthens human capability.

🔹 Why removing easy decisions can erode the experience people need for harder decisions later.

🔹 How PMO and transformation leaders can move forward before introducing more AI.

🔹 Why leaders need enough hands-on AI experience to guide implementation credibly.

🔹 What it means to move from process-oriented management toward judgment-oriented management.

Press play to learn how your PMO or transformation office can help the organization move faster without surrendering the judgment, adaptability, and accountability required to create measurable business IMPACT.

Connect with Jim Highsmith and Keep Exploring

Connect with Jim Highsmith on LinkedIn

Skills Build Teams. Judgment Builds Enterprises.

Your AI Is Working. Is Your Team Getting Better?

What the Dashboard Cannot See

The Next Ethical Frontier: Why AI Can’t Replace Judgment

Stop Picking Sides: Manage the Tension Between Adaptation and Optimization

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

This episode is personal for me in a way most podcast conversations are not.

For the first time, my son and co-author, Grayson Barnard, joins me on the PMO Strategies podcast. One of my closest friends, Dawn Mahan, is here too. The three of us talk about Projectland, baseball, the books we created together, and a leadership lesson PMO and transformation leaders cannot afford to miss.

You can do everything that looks like good project management and still fail to help the team win.

Your tool may be sophisticated. Your templates may be complete. Your governance process may be consistent. Your report may contain 85 metrics. None of that matters if leaders still cannot see the decision, the team is protecting activity that does not advance the outcome, or the project finishes without creating the business value it was funded to produce.

Grayson recognized that lesson immediately in Moneyball. The goal was not to replace star players with people who looked like star players. The goal was to find what produced wins and organize the team around it.

That is the question at the center of this episode: What is your team's version of getting on base?

In this episode, you will learn:

✅ Why Grayson believed Moneyball was the obvious story for our chapter.

✅ How to distinguish work that looks professional from work that advances the business outcome.

✅ Why individual performance measures can pull people away from the team win.

✅ How Dawn's Projectland characters help teams understand roles, sponsors, stakeholders, and saboteurs.

✅ How both Projectland books make serious leadership lessons more engaging and easier to apply.

✅ Why fun is not the opposite of disciplined performance.

✅ How to prepare a team for the moment the plan stops matching reality.

Connect with Grayson Barnard and Dawn Mahan

Grayson Barnard on LinkedIn

Dawn Mahan on LinkedIn

Explore Projectland

Read the free Moneyball sample chapter

ExploreProjectland Goes to the Movies

ExploreMeet the Players in Projectland

Browse the Projectland movie list on IMDb

Continue with the Executive Perspective

Continue the baseball connection and watch What Baseball Teaches Us About Project Management

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

A lot of PMOs are being asked to lead AI and agile transformation while still operating as reporting, governance, and oversight functions.

That is where things start to break.

Instead of simplifying work, AI can add more coordination, more noise, more duplicated effort, and more complexity.

The tools may be faster.

The organization may not be clearer.

And that is exactly why PMO and transformation leaders need to pay attention.

In this episode, I am joined by Paul McNamara, CEO and co-founder of Adaptovate, to talk about how PMOs can help organizations cut through AI chaos, redesign workflows, and move beyond pilots that never scale.

Paul has led business transformation across global organizations and works with executive teams to build the operating models, transformation capabilities, and human performance systems required to make change stick. His background spans product management, engineering, marketing, sales, leadership roles at Boston Consulting Group, and experience as a SaaS CFO.

That mix gives him a practical view of AI transformation: the business case, the operating model, the human side of change, and the delivery reality.

Together, we explore why many AI conversations are still stuck at the surface level, why measuring AI success by logins or usage can create the wrong behaviors, and why organizations risk repeating the same mistakes they made during Agile transformation.

What you’ll learn:

• Why AI adoption metrics can create the wrong behaviors.
• How duplicated agents can increase cost and confusion.
• What Agile transformation teaches us about AI pilots that do not scale.
• Why PMOs should focus on business enablement, not just process efficiency.
• How to start with one workflow people hate and build from there.

Press play and learn how PMO and transformation leaders can bring sanity to AI chaos and help their organizations turn AI activity into measurable business IMPACT.

Connect with Paul McNamara:

Visit Adaptovate

Take the AI Diagnostic

Connect with Paul on LinkedIn

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Already own the book on Audible, Kindle, or in print? Use the same page to upload your proof and join me live on August 20.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Ways of Working

Project management has more technology, training, certifications, and information than at any other point in the profession’s history.

But a better tool cannot rescue a plan the team never built together. AI cannot manage a risk nobody is actively addressing. A credential cannot replace the judgment that comes from applying the work inside a real organization.

That is the tension at the center of this special episode with my longtime friend and mentor Lee Lambert. Lee is a PMP, PMI Fellow, project management pioneer, and one of five people invited in 1981 to help create and implement the PMP certification program. We recorded this conversation as he approached his 80th birthday and reflected on more than 50 years of watching the profession change.

Lee shares what project management looked like before the modern tools and standards, what technology has made possible, and what still gets missed when teams use automation without understanding planning, dependencies, risk, people, and outcomes.

For PMO and transformation leaders, this is not a history lesson for nostalgia’s sake. It is a warning and an opportunity. The future will not reward the team with the most software. It will reward the leaders who know what must remain human, where discipline matters, and how to connect every delivery practice to the business outcome it is meant to create.

When you press play, you will hear:

🔹 Why automation can make weak information move faster when the planning underneath it is incomplete

🔹 What team-built work breakdown structures, dependencies, and critical-path thinking still reveal that a screen can hide

🔹 Why a risk register is not the same thing as active risk management

🔹 How AI can strengthen project work when leaders know what to ask and how to quality-check the answer

🔹 Why credentials and training must be paired with applied practice, mentoring, and continuous learning

🔹 What Lee’s medical diagnostic project taught him about the difference between delivering an output and creating the intended outcome

🔹 The two things Lee wants the next generation of project and PMO leaders to prioritize now

Press play above to hear the lessons Lee believes the profession must carry forward and decide which fundamentals your PMO needs to strengthen before the next wave of technology arrives.

Connect with Lee Lambert

Connect with Lee on LinkedIn

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

One of the fastest ways to weaken your influence as a PMO, project, or transformation leader is also one of the most common.

It sounds responsible. It sounds like alignment. It sounds like you are reinforcing executive support.

But every time you lead with “the sponsor said,” “the boss wants,” or “executives told me to,” you may be training the organization to look past you for the real decision maker.

That is how capable leaders accidentally become messengers.

In this episode, I share how delivery leaders dilute their own authority without realizing it and what to say instead. Because sponsors matter. Executive support matters. But hiding behind borrowed authority is not leadership. It positions you as the person passing along instructions instead of the leader responsible for helping the organization deliver outcomes.

What you’ll learn:

🔹 Why “the boss said so” quietly damages your credibility and authority

🔹 The difference between borrowed authority, positional authority, and business authority

🔹 How to use sponsor influence strategically without hiding behind it

🔹 What to say when you need resources, decisions, or support from another leader

🔹 How to connect requests to business outcomes instead of hierarchy

🔹 Why executives want leaders who can drive progress when they are not in the room

Press play and learn how to stop sounding like the messenger and start communicating like the leader responsible for the outcome.

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

There is a lot of pressure to prove your organization is keeping up with AI.

But the most important question is not whether AI is already inside your tools. It is whether your organization understands the work well enough to know what AI is about to amplify.

AI is exposing the difference between the way work is documented and the way work actually gets done. The process map shows the official steps. The real work often moves through conversations, relationships, judgment, informal decisions, and workarounds that never make it into the workflow.

I’m joined by David Dean, author of An Inbox Between Us and an enterprise AI strategist with two decades of experience in transformation. David calls AI a mirror because it can help leaders see the behavioral system operating beneath the formal one. That visibility can reveal where decisions stall, accountability drifts, people wait for permission, and teams quietly compensate for an operating model that is not helping the work move.

This matters for PMO and transformation leaders because the wrong first move is often to automate the process everyone already knows is frustrating. As David explains, AI can scale useful behavior, but it can also industrialize dysfunction. The better move is to slow down long enough to understand the pattern, solve the human problem underneath it, and then decide where technology can create meaningful business IMPACT.

What you will hear:

🔹 Why AI is revealing how work really gets done, not simply replacing tasks.

🔹 How the written contract and the unwritten contract shape organizational performance.

🔹 Why self-service AI and controlled AI require different expectations and guardrails.

🔹 What AI can reveal about slow decisions, unclear authority, and hidden workarounds.

🔹 How a simple spoken digital journal can be a starting point for organizational self-awareness.

Press play to hear how PMO and transformation leaders can use AI as a mirror, protect human judgment, and improve the operating model before they accelerate the wrong work.

Connect with David Dean

Visit David’s website

Connect with David on LinkedIn

ExploreAn Inbox Between Us

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Power Skills

What if the biggest thing limiting your influence is not your methodology, your governance model, your tools, or even your executive support?

What if it is the mindset you have been operating from without realizing it?

In PMO, project, and transformation work, scarcity is everywhere: not enough time, not enough funding, not enough resources, not enough sponsor support, not enough executive attention. And when you live inside that “not enough” environment every day, it can start shaping how you lead.

Scarcity mindset can cause leaders to protect territory, hold back information, compete for recognition, wait for permission, or delay investing in their own growth because they are too busy, too overwhelmed, or too focused on the cost.

But influence does not grow through protection.

It grows through value creation.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How scarcity mindset shows up in PMO and transformation leadership.

• Why “not enough” thinking can quietly shape the way you lead.

• How protecting territory, information, or credit can limit your future influence.

• Why investing in your own growth is not optional if you want to lead at the next level.

• What abundance mindset looks like for IMPACT Drivers.

• Why you do not wait until you are ready — you get ready by taking action.

This episode is for PMO, project, and transformation leaders who are tired of waiting for perfect conditions, permission, or certainty before stepping into the leader they know they are capable of becoming.

Press play and start shifting from “not enough” to “how might we make this work?”

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

Most PMOs are working hard. That is not the problem.

The problem is that the work they are doing is not always connected clearly enough to the outcomes executives care about. And when your PMO cannot connect its work to revenue, cost savings, risk reduction, strategic growth, or measurable business IMPACT, it becomes much easier for leaders to see the PMO as overhead instead of a strategic growth partner.

In this episode, I am joined by Rich Smith, a Chief Marketing Officer and growth strategist with over 25 years of experience leading digital transformation, revenue strategy, and cross-functional execution across B2B and B2C organizations. Rich has spent his career helping executives align leadership vision with measurable outcomes. He has been on both sides of the table: leading transformation efforts and serving as the executive customer of PMOs. His perspective is one you need to hear.

What Rich shares will sound familiar to every IMPACT Driver listening. The same gaps that hold PMO leaders back are happening in marketing, in sales, in operations, across every function. This is not a PMO problem. It is an organizational problem. And the good news is your PMO is positioned to fix it.

What You Will Learn:

🔹 Why executives may struggle to connect PMO reports to business outcomes

🔹 How to tie project work to revenue, cost savings, strategic risk, and measurable IMPACT

🔹 Why framing projects as risk avoidance can get faster executive buy-in

🔹 How to build a broader base of executive support beyond one sponsor

🔹 Why asking questions is a power move, not a sign of weakness

🔹 How to frame data so executives can absorb it and act on it

🔹 What the PMO of the future looks like and the design shift that changes everything

Press play and hear what your executives are thinking but not saying. This conversation will change how you show up in every executive room.

Connect with Rich Smith:

Visit His Website

Follow Rick on LinkedIn

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Business Acumen

Having more than one PMO is not the problem.

Disconnected PMOs are.

In larger organizations, it is completely normal to have an IT PMO, a business PMO, a transformation office, a product delivery function, and maybe even a strategy execution group all trying to help the organization get important work done.

That can be powerful.

But only if those teams are connected.

When they are not sharing information, coordinating resources, aligning priorities, or working from one enterprise view of strategy delivery, the organization starts paying the price.

Executives get different reports.

Teams compete for the same critical resources.

Priorities conflict.

Baton handoffs break down.

And strategy slows down.

In this episode, I’m talking about what really happens when your organization has multiple PMOs and how to move from fragmented delivery functions to one connected strategy delivery system.

You’ll learn:

• Why multiple PMOs are normal and when they become costly.

• How disconnected PMOs create different versions of the truth for executives.

• Why quiet competition between PMOs damages credibility and slows strategy delivery.

• How to treat information as infrastructure instead of power.

• Why resource conversations need to happen before conflicts land on exhausted team members.

• How better baton handoffs can keep strategy moving across delivery teams.

• Where an EPMO can help and why relationships still come before structure.

I also share a client example where one CEO was getting four different views of the organization’s delivery landscape, four different definitions of “on track,” and four different answers to one capacity question.

That is not a reporting problem.

That is a strategy delivery problem.

If your organization has multiple PMOs, transformation teams, product delivery functions, or strategy execution groups operating in parallel, this episode will help you see where the fragmentation is costing you and what to do about it.

Press play and learn how to stop competing for the same table and start building a stronger IMPACT Engine for the entire organization.

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS

Welcome to the PMO Strategies Podcast + Blog, where PMO leaders become IMPACT Drivers!

PMI Talent Triangle: Ways of Working

Organizations have more data than ever before.

More dashboards.

More reports.

More tools.

More conversations about AI.

And yet, many leaders still cannot get the trusted information they need to make fast, confident decisions.

In this episode, I am joined by Scott Ambler to discuss why organizations continue struggling with fragmented data, siloed systems, disconnected reporting, and decision-making delays.

Scott is a recognized thought leader, international keynote speaker, former Vice President at PMI, and co-author of 31 books, including his latest book, Not Just Data: How to Deliver Continuous Enterprise Data.

Together, we share why better decision-making does not come from creating more reports. It comes from building the systems that allow trusted enterprise data to flow continuously to the people who need it, when they need it.

If your organization is investing in dashboards, reporting tools, transformation, AI, or enterprise modernization, this conversation will help you see the data foundation underneath all of it.

What you’ll learn:

🔹 Why more reporting does not always lead to better decisions.

🔹 How siloed systems and disconnected data slow strategy execution.

🔹 Why executives may still lack decision-ready information with constant reports.

🔹 What continuous enterprise data pipelines are and why they matter.

🔹 Why AI cannot compensate for poor data quality.

🔹 How PMO and transformation leaders can help protect and prioritize the data work.

🔹 Why trusted data flow is becoming a strategy delivery capability, not just an IT concern.

Press play and learn why better decision-making does not start with more dashboards. It starts with trusted enterprise data that supports decisions, action, and measurable IMPACT.

Connect with Scott Ambler:

Follow Scott Ambler on LinkedIn

Visit ScottAmbler.com

P.S. If you know your PMO needs more funding, authority, or resources, but you are struggling to make the case in a way your executives will understand, join me for my free training, How to Build a Business Case for a Strategy-Driven PMO. I’ll show you how to connect the PMO to the business problems your executives already care about and make the case for the support you need.

Thanks for taking the time to check out the podcast!

I welcome your feedback and insights!

I’d love to know what you think and if you love it, please leave a rating and review in your favorite podcast player. Please leave a comment below to share your thoughts. See you online!

Warmly,

Laura Barnard

GET NOTIFIED ABOUT NEW EPISODES | TELL US WHAT YOU WANT TO LEARN | PDU REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS