Mapping Projects Back to Strategies

In order to be successful, IT needs to closely align its services to the Business's Strategy. This requires that the Enterprise Architecture group have a clear idea what the business strategies are! While I am actively studying the TOGAF architectural framework, I recognize that many Enterprise customers are unwilling to completely "buy in" to a specific framework. So this series of BLOG entries look to fill the void.

Illustration: Mind Map of Strategy to Goals to Projects

In a previous post, we described how the ERRC Canvas can help support the Strategy, by helping achieve the Goals. As we move from left to right through the above illustration, multiple Goals might be required to realize a Strategy. The ERRC canvas is a great tool for identifying activities, which broadly fall into the categories of Eliminate, Reduce, Raise and Create.

Building on that theme, and assuming we want SMART Goals (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-based), we can identify the Metrics, which are the measurements of success. Assuming we can cleanly map between the ERRC Canvas (representing the Goals) and the SMART Metrics for those avtivities, we can derive a Plan or Project to implement those Goals.

On the far right, we see the conventional wisdom that Project Plans contain elements of Budget, Timeline & Resources. The Project Plan is a culmination of the Strategy (Why), the Goals (What), the Metrics (How Much) and the Plan (Who). The Project Charter can define the When, as well as any required sequencing.

If you're curious about how projects evolve from a Project Charter through to successful delivery of the objectives & goals, take a look at my previous entry, entitled Project Management Life Cycle. I cannot stress enough the importance of proper planning ! When in doubt, think of the axiom "measure twice, cut once".

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From Business Strategy to IT Execution

Illustration - Strategy to Execution

As we have seen in my previous posts, I am always keen to tie IT Activities to Business Strategy. Whether it is in utilizing the CLAP Framework to map Business Activities to physical IT infrastructure, or in achieving your goals using the ERRC Canvas, the end-goal is always to drive Business Value.

In this basic diagram, the basic questions of Who, What, Why and How are directly addressed, leaving the When up to the Executive sponsors to decide in the Project Charter. The centrepiece is the ERRC Canvas, which helps define the Objectives (the What) & IT Activities that would meet the Goal. As with all SMART Goals, the element of Metrics help define the How.

Finally, the Plan is actually the domain of the Project Management Office. It would include the Project Charter and supporting artifacts, including dependency maps and budget estimates. Conventional Wisdom is that the Project Manager is responsible for Time, Resources and Budget.

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How to Achieve Your Goals - the ERRC Canvas

Illustration - the ERRC Canvas

 

As you might already know, I love canvases. They provide a simple means of communicating ideas. The image at left describes a very basic canvas to convey a very powerful idea: What do I have to do to achieve a Goal ?

In another BLOG entry, I will discuss Goals - specifically what makes good goals vs what makes difficult goals. If you want to do some homework, in a future BLOG I will discuss SMART Goals and why they are effective.

In general, and especially true in Business and IT, Goals can be achieved by placing tasks into one of four broad categories - Eliminate, Reduce, Raise, Create. Let's take a closer look at these simple yet powerful concepts. But remember, Goals are only important as a means of realizing a Strategy. Often, strategies are realized through the successful completion of a number of goals. Equally, there may be more than one Strategy being realized !

Eliminate - this is a pretty straightforward concept. Ask yourself the question "What do I need to remove from the environment to achieve the Goal ?". It could be simple, like lets eliminate duplicate services. If two systems can service the same Business Activity, then one of them is redundant. Ergo, one of them could be eliminated & help achieve the Goal.

Reduce - this is also a simple concept. If the Goal is to "decrease server sprawl", then the use of a consolidation solution (think of server virtualization) would reduce the number of physical compute hosts required to service the the Business Activities. Implementing server virtualization reduces the number of server's required to host the workloads, realizing the Goal.

Raise - this often goes hand-in-hand with Reduce in that often reducing one element will raise another. In the above example, we looked at implementing server-virtualization as a means of reducing server sprawl. It also has the opposite effect of raising the rate of physical server utilization !

Create - This is the tricky one. What do I have to ADD to the environment to achieve the goal ? Fortunately, the context of these canvases is around achieving IT Goals, in alignment with Business Strategy. So you might create a new process for deploying the virtualized servers into the compute environment, perhaps to enable a new Business Activity.

Now, each one of these sections of the canvas can contribute to the overall goal, meaning you might have many entries in each quadrant, all in alignment to the goal. This helps develop a list of activities which might need prioritization & dependency-mapping in order to complete. But at least now you have a defined method of achieving the established goal !

 

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