7 features for successful programme management with OpenProject

Programme management in public administration is complex. Multiple projects need to be coordinated, dependencies managed, and the achieved benefits demonstrated transparently. With PM², the project management methodology of the European Commission, there is a clear framework for this. The German Federal Office of Administration has adapted this standard with PMflex specifically for German authorities – practice-oriented and with checklists for programmes, portfolios, and projects.

To keep an overview as a programme manager, you need a central control point – a kind of cockpit that bundles all relevant information. The open source software OpenProject, developed in Europe, provides exactly this support. In this article, we present seven features that specifically support and empower you in programme management.

What does good programme management mean?

Good programme management means steering several interrelated projects so that they jointly deliver the planned benefits. Unlike project management, it is not only about successfully completing a single initiative, but about keeping the overall impact in focus. While portfolio management sets the strategic selection and prioritization, programme management ensures the coordinated operational execution.

For public administrations, this approach is crucial: programme management creates transparency, enables accountability to stakeholders, and ensures that political or organizational objectives are actually achieved.

Programme management in the public sector in Europe

The European Commission has developed PM², a standard that addresses exactly these requirements: phase models, roles, processes, and tools for projects and programmes. The German Federal Office of Administration has adapted this approach with PMflex to the needs of German authorities – with clear templates and practice-oriented checklists.

OpenProject supports you in implementing both approaches. With standardized workflows, transparency across programme structures, and central documentation, it is an ideal tool for managing programmes according to PM² and PMflex.

Conseil

Of course, OpenProject supports not only programme management but also project and portfolio management. Projects form the operational level, programmes bundle several projects with a shared benefit, and portfolios provide the strategic orientation. With OpenProject, administrations have one solution that covers all three levels – integrated, transparent, and compliant with PM² and PMflex.

Seven features for successful programme management

• 1. Define a life cycle: Phases and Phase Gates
• 2. Keep the overview: Programme dashboards
• 3. Clarify dependencies: Milestones and relations
• 4. Make impact visible: Outputs, outcomes, and benefits
• 5. Detect problems early: Risk and Issue management
• 6. Create transparency: Reports and controlling
• 7. Strengthen collaboration: Meetings based on work packages

1. Define a life cycle: Phases and Phase Gates

In PM² and PMflex, phases and phase gates are central building blocks. Every programme runs through defined stages – from initiation through planning and implementation to closure. At the phase gates, it is checked whether a phase has been successfully completed and whether the next one may start. This governance ensures that decisions are transparent and traceable.

OpenProject helps you apply this logic in practice. Even in the cost-free Community Edition, you can create and monitor phases and phase gates according to PM² specifications. In the Enterprise Edition, you can customize them individually as well as add new phases or phase gates. This way, you stay in control – and always know whether your programme is on track.

2. Keep the overview: Programme dashboards and baseline

For programme managers, a quick overview at the programme level is essential:

• Monitor the status of all sub-projects (e.g. phase, phase-gate status, traffic light).
• Detect deviations and bottlenecks early (schedule, budget, quality).
• Track upcoming milestones and deadlines.
• Identify risks and issues that need to be escalated.
• Consolidate key figures for reporting and decision-making.

With OpenProject, you set up an overview page (dashboard) for each programme that displays all relevant information. In addition, you can create, filter, save and share project lists to consolidate the metrics of all sub-programs or sub-projects in one clear table. To dive deeper into work packages, risks, and recent changes, you can use the Baseline feature.

Returning to the cockpit metaphor from the introduction: in OpenProject, this becomes your cockpit, where all information is available at a glance and forms the basis for well-founded decisions at any time.

3. Clarify dependencies: Milestones and relations

Programmes consist of many sub-projects with close content-related and time-related interdependencies. To detect delays or conflicts at an early stage, dependencies and common milestones must always be visible.

In OpenProject, you represent a programme as a project with sub-projects. Dependencies are managed through the diverse relations types between work packages:

• Temporal dependencies such as predecessor / successor.
• Logical relations such as blocks / blocked by or includes.
• Parent-child relations to clearly structure complex tasks.
• Programme-level milestones that apply to multiple sub-projects.

These dependencies can be visualized in different views – for example, in the Gantt chart for timelines, in table views for detailed overviews, or also in parent-child boards (Enterprise add-on) to visualize the hierarchy of work packages.

4. Make impact visible: Outputs, outcomes, and benefits

In PM² and PMflex, a clear distinction is made between three levels:

• Outputs are the tangible results of a project, e.g. a new IT system.
• Outcomes are the direct effects when these results are used, e.g. active use of the system.
• Benefits are the long-term value for the organization, e.g. more efficient processes or reduced costs.

For programme managers, it is crucial to keep this entire chain of impact in view, rather than focusing only on the completion of individual deliverables.

OpenProject supports you by allowing outputs, outcomes, and benefits to be defined as separate work package types. These types can be equipped with status transitions for custom workflows, attributes, and status values, and tailored exactly to the specific steering needs. This creates a transparent structure that makes it clear at any time whether the programme is actually delivering the planned benefits.

5. Detect problems early: Risk and issue management

Good risk management helps you sleep at night. As a programme manager, you need to keep an eye not only on current problems but also on potential risks and issues that may endanger the entire programme.

In OpenProject, risks and issues can be represented just like Outputs or Outcomes as their own work package types – with individual workflows and attributes. This allows you to manage probabilities of occurrence, impacts, and countermeasures systematically and ensures that critical points are not lost in the daily project routine.

Remarque

The OpenProject team is currently working intensively on an extended risk module that will soon support the PMflex requirements even more consistently and enable more precise control at the programme level. Stay up to date: Risk module development on OpenProject Community

6. Create transparency: Reports and controlling

For programme managers, it is essential to always have reliable information available – for their own control and for mandatory reporting upwards. You need clarity about the status of your programme, and at the same time standardized documentation to reliably inform portfolio managers, agency leaders, or political decision-makers.

OpenProject provides standardized reports and controlling features for this purpose. Status reports, budget overviews, or progress analyses can be consolidated and exported directly as PDFs – ideal for regular communication with stakeholders. In addition, OpenProject takes PMflex templates into account, so your reports comply with established standards and are ready to use without additional editing.

This way, you keep your own overview while at the same time providing transparent, comparable information for control at portfolio and management level.

7. Strengthen collaboration: Meetings based on work packages

What if your team meetings started exactly where the actual work happens? Instead of meticulously gathering information from emails or external Word or Excel documents, in OpenProject you can directly access work packages stored in the programme or sub-project.

This way, you create agendas with the relevant topics in no time, document results directly during the meeting, and generate minutes immediately – in the OpenProject style, with links to the respective risks, milestones, outcomes, and more. Everyone involved stays aligned, and traceability is ensured at all times. OpenProject’s Meetings module is a highlight for many programme managers, and offers significant advantages, especially in public sector programmes with many stakeholders.

Conclusion: Successfully implementing programme management with PM² and PMflex

Programme managers in public administrations face the task of steering complex initiatives transparently and traceably. With PM² and PMflex, clear standards are available – and with OpenProject, a tool that consistently supports these standards in practice.

From phase gates to dashboards, risk management, and meetings: OpenProject provides you with an integrated “cockpit” that ensures governance, creates transparency, and strengthens collaboration. This way, you not only guide programmes reliably through the individual phases but also ensure that the planned outcomes and benefits are actually achieved.

Especially in public administration, where traceability and accountability are crucial, OpenProject is the right solution to bring programmes to success according to European standards.