Welcome to the Winter 2018 edition of the APM Portfolio Management SIG newsletter

Welcome to the Winter edition of the APM Portfolio Management SIG newsletter

Introduction by the SIG Chairs

On behalf of the Portfolio Management SIG committee we hope you have had a good start to 2018 and that this will be another year of progress for everyone.

As in recent years, this is the time when the SIG committee are busy planning the annual Portfolio Management conference, to be held in London on Thursday 17 May. We hope we will see even more of you at this year’s event, after your tremendous contribution to the success of our 2017 conference. The theme for 2018 is about looking forward to how PfM should evolve and develop to help organisations maximise the value from their investments in change, in an increasingly complex and challenging environment.

We are pleased to announce that we are in the final review stage of the APM’s first portfolio management guide, which will be introduced at our 2018 PfM Conference and published shortly thereafter. It draws on real-life experiences of what has been proven to work and should help individuals in all business sectors and at various stages in their portfolio management careers with real, practical advice and enable them to discover new insights into portfolio management.

Our next publication in our Managing the Portfolio series of thought leadership reports is also expected to be showcased at the conference, and we hope the interest shown to date will continue.

Our plans for 2018-19 include a continuation of various joint initiatives with branches and other SIGs to help further promote the role and value of PfM in organisations.

As always, please let us have any thoughts, comments, and suggestions etc. to portfoliosig@apm.org.uk

Stephen Parrett and Steve Leary
APM Portfolio Management SIG Co Chairs

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2018 Portfolio Management SIG Conference

This is our main event of the year, and its theme is “Maximising value from portfolio management”. We hope everyone taking part will make it the most successful Portfolio Management SIG conference so far. We are expecting well over 100 delegates, and we are making sure that there will be plenty of time to mix with each other, our excellent speakers, workshop leads and a variety of guests.

Our fifth Portfolio Management SIG annual conference, sponsored for the 2nd time by Hyde Park Solutions, will look at how prepared organisations are for the challenges of today and also ahead on ways to maximise the value of Pfm and achieve the corporate goals.

The conference will include:

• Presentations by top quality, senior level speakers, from:
  - ABB
  - The Open University (APM 2017 Award winner in “PMO of the Year” category)
  - MS Amlin
  - HM Customs & Revenue
  - One other high level specialist speaker just confirming as we’re going to press!
  
  
• Structured break-out workshops are planned to address key emerging topics:
  - Getting innovation into the portfolio – leading edge thinking, approach and practice.
  - “Agile” portfolio management – what is it and how can we make it work?
  Reference Class Forecasting – optimising the overall portfolio cost and schedule based on ‘big data’, and how to apply these ground-breaking techniques.

These workshops are addressing key elements of the portfolio lifecycle - generation of innovative pre-project ideas, in-flight agile management of the portfolio, and how to make significant overall improvements in the planning of the portfolio to increase predictability and delivery confidence.

The day will offer opportunities to network with colleagues, speakers and workshop leads throughout the day, and in the early evening at our popular drinks reception.

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Introduction to Portfolio Management guide

The SIG’s first portfolio management guide is nearing completion, and will be going through the APM’s review process in March and then into publication.

Our guide will be available in mid-2018, with a taster (and advance orders) at the SIG conference in May.

The guide is designed to serve three main aims:

• Promote awareness of, and good/best practice in, portfolio management for the executive, the practising or developing portfolio manager or the portfolio office manager;
• Provide a benchmark for portfolio managers and the portfolio community to assess their own organisation’s maturity in the discipline;
• Stimulate new thinking and contribute to the further development of portfolio management practice.

Look out for more news over the next few months.

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Thought Leadership reports

Our first thought leadership report, or opinion piece, under the Managing the Portfolio banner was launched in 2017 at our annual conference with considerable interest, over 100 copies were issued.

The second and third parts are now in development:

• “Clearing the fog” - making sense of all of the change and gaining visibility and clear line-of-sight.
• “Shaping the pathway” - prioritising and balancing.

They are aimed at a wide business audience – senior executives, change managers, operational managers and project, programme and portfolio professionals. These will provide an end to end perspective and address practical challenges on how to think differently about portfolio management.

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SIG, branch and volunteer liaison

Following very successful Pfm sessions at meetings of the Thames Valley, Yorkshire & North Lincolnshire and London branches over the last 18 months, we aim to extend these to other branches through 2018.

These sessions can be an overview of good/best practice, expansion and discussion of topics based on our new pfm guide, or innovation, agile Pfm or reference class forecasting from our conference workshops. We have also taken part in panel sessions and questions and answers – we are happy to work with you to help meet the needs of your corporate and individual members.

If you would like your local branch to be included in our plans, please let us know – there is still time as we are not yet fully committed.

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Stephen and Steve
APM Portfolio Management SIG Co Chairs

Emails: portfoliosig@apm.org.uk