Programme Initiation and Planning
Identify the need for a programme and draft a programme plan. Programme plans should address schedule, resources, costs, scope, governance, risk management, execution, oversight, and control.
Improvement Planning
Practices-Outcomes-Metrics (POM)
Representative POMs are described for Programme Initiation and Planning at each level of maturity.
- 1Initial
- Practice
- Rely on the best endeavours of staff.
- Outcome
- An immediate basic capability is turned on.
- Metric
- Number of experienced staff.
- Practice
- Leverage professional associations and networking to identify working approaches known to be effective.
- Outcome
- The implementation of working approaches that are known to be effective is very fast.
- Metric
- Number of approaches, methods, tools, or processes adapted from outside to get up and running.
- 2Basic
- Practice
- Develop clear guidelines for programme approvers that clarify decision criteria.
- Outcome
- Approvals and rejection decisions are faster and more consistent.
- Metric
- Elapsed time from submission to approval of decision.
- Practice
- Develop clear guidelines and instructions for staff preparing programme proposals, and ensure they understand the decision processes.
- Outcome
- Programme proposals are easily mapped to decision criteria, yielding faster and more consistent decisions.
- Metric
- Elapsed time from submission to approval of decision.
- 3Intermediate
- Practice
- Develop guidelines for the evaluation of risk associated with programme approvals.
- Outcome
- Approval and rejection decisions are made faster and are more consistent.
- Metric
- Elapsed time from submission to approval of decision.
- Practice
- Develop guidelines for the treatment of programme risk and its reporting in programme proposals.
- Outcome
- Programme risks in proposals are easily mapped to decision criteria, yielding faster and more consistent decisions.
- Metric
- Elapsed time from submission to approval of decision.
- 4Advanced
- Practice
- Use advanced approaches that will systematically test the assumptions upon which the business case was developed.
- Outcome
- Business case credibility is enhanced.
- Metric
- Ratio of actual costs and revenues from programmes to business case predicted values.
- Practice
- Test stakeholder support for the programme prior to approving it — i.e. ensure the programme is capable of success.
- Outcome
- There is increased likelihood of programme success.
- Metrics
- Number of programmes in difficulty due to stakeholder support issues.
- Number and cost of stakeholder issues.
- 5Optimized
- Practice
- Develop and set feasibility criteria for the programme at the following levels: technical, financial, resource demand, competence, skill/competence, knowledge and organizational capability.
- Outcome
- Faster, more reliable go/no-go decisions on programme evaluations, and fewer failures are evident.
- Metric
- Number of failed projects that were found to be infeasible.
- Practice
- Develop guidelines for programme proposers to document feasibility criteria for the programme at technical; financial; resource demand; competence, skill/competence, knowledge and organizational capability levels.
- Outcome
- Faster, more reliable go/no-go decisions on programme evaluations and fewer failures are evident.
- Metric
- Number of failed projects that were found to be not feasible.