An overview of things to consider when determining if projects are aligned with business objectives.

1. Catalyst
Project Solutions
Business Strategy and Project Alignment
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2. Perils of Uncontrolled Projects
• Business goals are not met and valuable
resources are wasted when projects are not
aligned with strategic business plans.
• Uncoordinated development results in projects
that are non-aligned, duplicative or unneeded -
increases overall costs.
• Lack of project management practices increases
risk, causes budget and schedule overruns, and
compromises functionality.

3. Budget Measures Not Enough
• Budget based project selection criteria are
insufficient to insure that projects are aligned
with strategic goals.
• No relationship to actions that produce results.
• No information about what needs to happen in
the future.
• Does not show if strategies are effective.
• Accounting, not operational view of the project
process.

4. Aligning Projects
• Utilize multiple metrics to measure project
utility/performance: Financial, Customer,
Business Process, Growth and
Learning perspectives.[1]
• Project justification includes a business
case or value proposition that
encompasses all four perspectives.
[1] “The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy Into Action”, Robert S. Kaplan
and David P. Norton

5. Controlling Projects
• Establish common metrics, methods, and
reporting tools, create a common project
repository.
• Use standard processes and templates for
all projects.
• Select, prioritize, and authorize projects at
high level by groups/managers
representative of all business units.

6. Getting Projects Under Control
Step 1: Project Management Office (PMO)
• Integrated into the organization.
• Common repository and reporting.
• Standard processes and templates.
• Coaching and support for projects.
• Organization wide tracking of business
metrics.

7. PMO Value Proposition
• Reduced cycle time and delivery costs.
• Early ID of project issues and risks.
• Improved quality of project deliverables.
• Better containment of project scope.
• Improved accuracy of estimates.
• Opportunities to reuse knowledge.
• Better stakeholder communications.
• Improved people and resource management.

8. Getting Projects Under Control
Step 2: Project Portfolio Management (PPM)
• Value based measures of project utility.
• Business strategy sets the specific metrics and
actions by which projects are selected.
• Targets constraints/impediments to meeting
business objectives (weakest link).
• Establishes the process for selecting and
prioritizing competing projects.
• High level decisions that focus on total
organization needs, not a division.

9. PPM Value Proposition
• Resources are allocated to the most important
work.
• Improved alignment of projects with business
objectives.
• Better balance of projects.
• Improved scrutiny of project requests.
• More open authorization process.
• Increased communication and collaboration.
• Low value projects are killed.

10. Balanced Scorecard Metrics
Projects are evaluated in four areas:
• Financial – How does this project provide value
to our shareholders?
• Customer – How does this project make us
appear to our customers?
• Business Processes – How does this project
improve our ability to respond?
• Learning and Growth – How does this process
sustain change and improvement?