A Project Management Office (PMO), sometimes also referred to as an Enterprise PMO and or Centre of Excellence is a business unit that has department or organization-wide authority to ensure consistency in the management of all projects.
This gives projects the best possible chance of success by ensuring standardization and introducing economies of repetition in the execution of projects. The PMO is the source of documentation, guidance and metrics on the practice of project management and execution.
Running a successful PMO requires careful planning; from the initial piloting of the PMO to its full launch. As with any significant change initiative, there must be a change management process in place to guide people through the transition period.
The creation of a PMO Centre of Excellence includes creating a vision, strategies, governance, and processes. It will know how to measure its own success as well as that of projects and will have identified quality criteria for all project management processes and documents.