PMO Hackathon

If I invited you to try out a PMO Hackathon, what would be your first reaction?

"I have no idea what you're talking about!!"

"Yep, count me in, it sounds all modern and trendy, I'll give it a go"

"Eeek it sounds like hard work, not sure about that"

"It sounds a bit scary, I'm not sure I'm technically savvy enough"

That's been some of the responses we have so far as we set about planning the first PMO Hackathon in London later this month.

The PMO Flashmob is all about trying new ways to bring PMO professionals together to learn, network and generally do that in a more informal way.

We thought why not try something which is normally the reserve for developers? It could work for PMO people right?

You can take a look at the event if you're interested in coming along here.

It takes place at Ticketmaster HQ in Islington, London and the session is hosted by Head of Projects at Ticketmaster, John McIntyre.

How will it work?

We’ll get together at 2pm, when John formally kicks off the Hackathon. We’ll generate ideas that people want to collaborate on and form into teams. To make the Hackathon more interesting, we’ll be adding an element of competition to the proceedings. All teams will present back on what they have worked on and how they have got on. A judging panel will award prizes to the best teams. At some point during the Hackathon pizza will appear, and we’ll transition from tea/coffee to wine/beer as we move into the evening.

What sort of things will teams work on?

That’s down to the teams. We will encourage attendees to share ideas, and teams can form around the most popular ideas. You may have ideas in your head now that you’d like to collaborate on – if so, please bring them along! Don’t worry if you don’t have a ‘killer idea’ – they’ll be enough suggestions and ideas for everyone to work on during the day. Here’s a few examples to get your creative juices flowing:

• Developing new project reporting standards that work well on mobile devices
• Automating mundane/repeatable tasks in Project Server, or some other PPM tool
• Creating Excel macros to produce consolidated portfolio risk logs, with trend analysis
• Visualising portfolio projects data using D3 or Gephi
• Creating dynamic information radiators that sponsors will WANT to read
• Developing automated ‘audit bots’ that can undertake basic project reviews, freeing up valuable time

What skills should I bring to the table?

Let’s be clear, people can learn a lot from their peers at hackathons, but hackathons are not training sessions. You do not have to be an expert developer, but for you to be able to contribute effectively to a team you should be comfortable finding your way around a dataset, be familiar with one or more PPM tools, be comfortable developing PMO reporting and be passionate about simplification and automation. We will be inviting a few subject matter experts to join us for the day, but the bulk of the work will come from you!

Can I work on a problem that I am experiencing in my organization?

Yes! The more real-world topics we can hack, the better. Please note that as you will be working in teams and sharing ideas with PMO people across the community then you will need to be comfortable that the data and systems you use are not confidential, and that you are authorized to use them on the day. If in doubt, bring dummy data and examples to work on.

This all sounds a bit serious – is this for me?

Absolutely. Hackathons are collaborative and fun. You get a unique opportunity to collaborate with your peers from other organizations, gain valuable experience and shape the future of PMO Reporting and Actionable Insight Generation.

Bring your PMO team

It's also an excellent event to get all your PMO team out of the office for a few hours - all working together on a PMO problem. You could also be crowned winners of the PMO Hackathon for 2017!

If you're interested in having a go - don't be afraid, we're all learning together :)

For more information http://pmoflashmob.org/pmo-hackathon-london-18th-october/