What is the Difference Between Project and Portfolio Management?

PM is an acronym for project management. However, there are other ways to explain what PPM and PgM stand for: Portfolio management refers to each individual project, while Program management refers to the company's overall portfolio. Here's a quick explanation that should help you know the differences and make your life a bit easier in the future!

What is Portfolio Management?

A portfolio is a high-level view of all the activities an organization is running in order to meet their main strategic objectives. It could be every activity across the entire company, division, or department.

According to project manager Bob Buttrick, part of project management is executing projects properly. That's what Portfolio Management is all about. In Agile portfolio management, it's all about embracing Agile principles in order to organize and plan for programs and projects within the portfolio, ensuring adaptability and responsiveness to changing requirements and market dynamics.

Project portfolio management software evaluates a company's projects, seeing how they're being executed, what could be improved, and whether the expected benefits are being realized.

What is Program Management?

Programs are groups of related projects that contribute to one main objective or benefit. The group as a whole has a clearly stated goal and each project within its plan can assist with achieving that goal.

Program managers are responsible for managing the overarching framework of an initiative, and also for making sure individual projects are coordinated and successful. They are less concerned with a given project's success, as opposed to how well it contributes to the program's success. Additionally, they're more focused on ensuring that the right projects get priority or support. Programs may have a set end date or be ongoing initiatives–it really depends on what outcomes they seek to achieve.

Managing projects as part of a larger program is the best option for you to give yourself better control and benefits, coordinate and prioritize resources across multiple projects, and oversee progress and outcomes more easily.

What is Project Management?

Projects can focus on a greater level of detail. Portfolios and programs deal with a higher level overview, while projects are more specific: they aim to provide a benefit within a particular time-frame.

A project manager is responsible for overseeing projects. They ensure that projects are completed on time, within budget, and meet the established demands. They also determine best practices in order to improve efficiency. In addition, they work with stakeholders to make sure the benefits you're expecting are realized.

If a company is going to succeed, it needs to provide the right environment for its employees. One of the best ways to help employees do this is good project management. Project management ensures that your team members work collaboratively and constantly develop and improve themselves, giving your business a competitive advantage.

Learn More About Project Management

If you're new to project management, we've got a great resource right here for you. It's called The Project Management Guide for Beginners, and we offer it free of charge so that you can reference it anytime.