Areas Of Expertise

• PMO setup, development and implementation of project management governance models and frameworks
• planning and scheduling
• portfolio, program and project governance
• Reporting

Education

• Bachelor of Information Systems (BIS) – Melbourne University
• PMI Scheduling Professional (PMI-SP)
• PRINCE2 Foundation
• PRINCE2 Practitioner
• SAFe Certified Agilist

Key Clients

• Future Fund Management Agency
• AGL
• AusNet Services
• Telstra Health
• Cbus
• Latitude Financial Services
• NAB Wealth
• Telstra
• SuperPartners
• Department of Justice
• Aurecon

About Vanessa Vella

Vanessa is a skilled PMO Lead specialising in complex PMO analysis and setup, as well as scheduling and planning, who joined Seven Consulting’s Melbourne team in June 2015. 

Vanessa is experienced in establishing and maintaining PMO controls, including project and program-level status reporting, risk and issue management, SharePoint, and document management, change control, resource planning, and in particular, is highly capable in the production and maintenance of project schedules and dependencies management. 

She has excellent interpersonal communication and negotiation skills with the ability to interact and work with project managers, stakeholders at all levels (including Executives), and as a key member of the PMO team. Additionally, she is able to coach project managers and team members in the effective use of tools, templates, schedule development / maintenance and procedures.

What Vanessa brings

• Experienced in managing vendor relationships and providing analysis of vendor reporting.
• Highly skilled in program and project planning and governance methodologies and frameworks.
• Expert in the use of Project Management tools including Microsoft Project and Primavera.
• Extensive experience in developing and implementing standardised project and program controls, including, risks and issues management, schedule and dependency management, SharePoint and document management and reporting.

Key Achievements

As the Senior PMO Analyst at Future Fund Management Agency, Vanessa was responsible for uplifting existing and implementing new project management and governance frameworks, processes and templates, as well as increasing the project delivery capability across the organisation through greater support and training. As part of the PMO, Vanessa was also responsible for overseeing the Strategic Projects Portfolio (budget ~$40m) and yearly Business Planning initiatives which required a greater focus toward governance, insights and analysis and required reporting to both the Senior Leadership Team and Board. Vanessa was also instrumental in the initial phase of the Agency’s ERP Implementation project, acting in lieu of a Project Manager, before one could be assigned. During this time, Vanessa managed team members, ensured deliverables were delivered, key deadlines were met and facilitated several product demonstrations.

As PMO Consultant at AGL – Customer Markets Value Office Management Team, Vanessa was responsible for producing leadership level reporting, performing quality assurance, risk and issue, and change request management and coordinating the facilitation of the various Program Management forums, including knowledge sharing and stand-up sessions. She assisted in the transition of the Value Office PMO to the Value Management Team, by way of managing transition tasks and chairing team stand-ups, updating processes, including the delivery framework, developing communications and quick reference guides, reconfiguring the Intranet site, and assisting in the set up of Amplify, the benefits management tool.

As PMO Consultant at AusNet Services – Technology Planning & Portfolio Services (TPPS), Vanessa worked as part of a small team, performing a five-week forensic examination of the structure and effectiveness of the current AusNet Services TPPS PMO frameworks and functions, utilising best practice and industry standards. She conducted stakeholder interviews and the analysis of artefacts, for input into a detailed As-Is diagnosis report. Vanessa also developed the To-Be design of a best practice PMO framework tailored to the specific requirements of AusNet Services, including the conceptual Target Operating Model, and the change management and implementation plan of the required uplift activities.

As PMO Consultant at Telstra Health – National Cancer Screening Register (NCSR) Program, Vanessa worked as a master scheduler / PMO specialist on the Release 2 Cervical Cancer Program to deliver a functioning national register, complete with cervical cancer screening functionality. She developed and maintained the Release 2 schedule, performing analysis and reporting on progress and areas of contention for senior leadership. Vanessa also delivered the NCSR Scheduling Suite, consisting of an Uplift Capability Plan, operating rhythm, minimum standards, and training information pack. She assisted with PMO functions, including the delivery of an updated Change Request Management Plan, Operations Risk Management pack, Resourcing Strategy presentation, Sustainability Proposal and RAID Management Plan, as well as participating and documenting a PMO As-Is To-Be Assessment.

As a PMO consultant at Cbus, Vanessa worked as part of a small team, to review the structure and effectiveness of the current Cbus PMO frameworks and functions, utilising the P3O framework. Vanessa performed stakeholder interviews and analysis of artefacts, for input into a detailed As-Is diagnosis report and participated in the To-Be design of a best practice PMO framework tailored to the specific requirements of Cbus, including the conceptual Target Operating Model, change management and implementation plan.

As a Senior PMO Analyst / Master Scheduler at Latitude Financial Services – Transformation Program, aiming to uplift the customer experience and user experience in the rapidly changing financial services industry, Vanessa setup and implemented standard PMO functions, including, SharePoint and document management, risks and issues management, schedule and dependency management, and program-level reporting.

As Master Scheduler at NAB Wealth, Vanessa worked on the e-Commerce ATO Simplification Program aiming to fulfil the ATO’s superannuation compliance obligations and uplift NAB Wealth’s infrastructure for future compliance projects. Vanessa facilitated top-down planning workshops for budget submissions, worked with key delivery partners, and vendors to develop bottom-up schedules, conducted replanning exercises, trained project analysts, and performed weekly status updates and reporting.

As a Master Scheduler / PMO specialist at Telstra, Vanessa worked on the high profile Structural Separation Undertaking (SSU) Program, aiming to fulfil Telstra’s regulatory and compliance obligations to the ACCC, Vanessa had end-to-end responsibility for tracking and reporting all projects and systems within the program, developing and maintaining the integrated schedule, reporting on status and trend to the program director, participating in change control processes, and highlighting potential threats to the ACCC deadline.

As Project Analyst on the Telstra Access Governance project, Vanessa created and then managed the schedule, risks, issues, and actions registers and procurement activities. Within this project, Vanessa also performed the role of Test Manager on User Acceptance Testing. This included documenting the UAT Scope Statement and Master UAT Test Plan, documenting UAT Test Cases, coordinating testers during the execution of testing, performing defect management, and obtaining sign-off of the UAT Test Summary Report.

As a PMO consultant at SuperPartners, Vanessa provided high quality project scheduling, planning, and PMO support to 11 project managers to plan, resource and status 24 project schedules as well as manage labour costs and expenses. She provided capability uplifts around scheduling concepts / tools to various stakeholders. Key member in the development of Schedule Management Standard. Vanessa was responsible for extracting schedule data including time and costs for inclusion into weekly status and steering committee reports. She also provided detailed cost and resource analysis and planning function for the PMO and assisted in the creation and maintenance of a centralised document repository within the PMO for quality and governance management.

As IT Support Analyst at Aurecon – Service Desk Delivery Project, Vanessa was involved in the initial creation and setup for the service desk for the corporate office. Played a key role in the design, build, and launch of intranet resources for project and service desk team. This included online toolkits containing risks, issues, templates, user guides, and processes.