BPUG Congress

Last week we attended the second annual BPUG Congress, and from the conversations we have had, we can say that there is a lot of evidence that organisations are becoming increasingly sophisticated in their approach to project management. The delegates we spoke to were of a very high calibre – and all of them had specific questions and issues which they had come to the Congress to address.

Members of our Marketing and Client Relations teams (including Craig Aldridge, Sam Tuckey, Nick Tipping and Director William Franklin), spent the two days talking to delegates and attending the sessions. William said that it was a very enjoyable couple of days and that the atmosphere was excellent because people were focused on specific questions they wanted answers to.

We had some extremely interesting conversations with delegates and were able to give help and advice to those who wanted to get on and start making a difference to their organisations by adopting Best Practice.

Our CEO Melanie Franklin found that delegates had already implemented project management and their interest had now been elevated to programme management. She said that “more senior executives are becoming aware that programme management provides a strategic route map, and they’re willing to fund programme and project offices because they realise they will achieve efficiencies that have otherwise eluded them”.


Not surprisingly, Sue Vowler’s presentation on P3O (Portfolio, Programme & Project Offices) was very well attended as delegates grappled with how to make the new guidance work in their organisations.

Perhaps the economic climate has honed the focus of board level executives to getting things done, and they want to know how initiatives such as P3O will contribute to the bottom line.

We were also delighted to meet the author of the Stepping into Project Management blog, Soma, which we all follow avidly – along with Elizabeth’s lovely PM4Girls.