Project Portfolio Planning
Project Portfolio Planning
The Project Portfolio Planning capability’s enablers include Business Requests, Demand Management, and Project Governance. Each capability within the Planview Capability Framework has a distinct set of features and functionality, business processes, best practices, and analytics and reports that deliver value to customers in the form of specific business outcomes.
Project Portfolio Planning Business Outcomes
Business Requests
- We have a single repository to collect requests from the business, which is available to all stakeholders in the organization.
- We have a structured process to categorize, assess, and carry out sizing estimation of these requests before taking them for consideration as new investments.
Demand Management
- We have a consistent demand management process for all work/projects.
- We can describe and categorize projects based on our organizational data model and attributes.
- We have a single repository of all projects, which includes new (not yet approved), approved, active, and completed projects.
Project Governance
- We have a structured process to capture, assess, estimate, and approve projects.
- We can ensure that the appropriate governance process is applied to projects, based on specific criteria.
- We can measure effectiveness, identify and remove bottlenecks, anticipate future issues, and adapt program workflow to optimize performance.
- We can control the progression of a project through the delivery process and ensure all appropriate actions/steps have been taken at each stage.
Project Portfolio Planning Processes
This capability supports a clear and consistent process for initiating new business requests, managing valuable programs, and progressing projects through execution/delivery.
Business Requests Process Steps
This supports a clearly-defined process to initiate a business request, including collecting relevant categorization/scoring information and initial financial data.
Business requests process flow
| Process Step | Description |
|---|---|
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Initiate request
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Requests provide one way that new entities (e.g. projects, programs, products) can be initiated in Enterprise One. It is an opportunity to ensure that the incoming requests are well defined, categorized, and assigned to the right area(s) for delivery. This also allows requests to be evaluated against each other to compare scoring, impacts, and alignment. When a new request is created, certain fields will be required to ensure the data needed for appropriate categorization is provided. Request assignment and any lifecycle steps will start following your defined governance process. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Describe and categorize request |
During the initiation of a request, information is populated into Enterprise One to describe and categorize the request within the register. Often a minimum level of required categorization/descriptive information is enforced during the creation of the request via a lifecycle workflow to satisfy the specific data and information needs of the organization. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Review request |
Once you have a request portfolio, you can see detailed information regarding the requests that are included in your portfolio on the Portfolio Manager tile within the Request Portfolio View screen. This will allow the request to be reviewed in preparation for dispatch. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Dispatch/associate request |
The purpose of this step is to connect the request with a relevant entity in Enterprise One. This can be achieved by either dispatching the request which generates a new entity or associating it with an already existing one. Enterprise One can route requests to a dispatcher, who is the user responsible for evaluating the requests and then performing the following tasks. Depending on whether your system supports request lifecycles, a dispatcher can perform those tasks through request lifecycles or from the Request View screen without the use of lifecycles. The dispatcher can:
A dispatcher can share dispatching responsibilities with other users. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Close request |
If approval is not granted or the request is no longer needed, change the status to closed. This provides a record of its status for reporting and ensures that no further updates can be made to the request. Depending on the internal business process, the process to close the request can vary and may contain approval gates in a lifecycle workflow. In these instances, successful completion of the lifecycle steps by the relevant users will automatically close the Request. The status of the request can be changed in the Request Detail screen, or directly in the Portfolio Manager using an appropriate column set selection. For more information, see the following articles: |
Demand Management Process Steps
This supports the creation of new work/projects and the entry of descriptive and categorization information.
All work is centralized and can be tracked and reported on through various statuses.
Demand management process flow
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Create project |
A project is where work is planned, the is also known as the Primary Planning Level (PPL). It contains the breakdown of the work in the form of tasks, assignments, financial information, timelines, roadmaps, baselines, and other information needed for a project to be successful. When a new project is created, certain fields will be required to ensure the data needed for appropriate categorization is provided. Project assignment and any lifecycle steps will start following your defined governance process. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Describe and categorize project |
During the creation process for each new project, relevant description and categorization information should be captured through a lifecycle-driven configured screen. Project attributes can be edited on the Work View screen of the project and can be viewed in the Work Portfolio view. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Plan high-level schedule dates and milestones |
To form a high-level project schedule, you can build out the Work Breakdown Structure. As part of this step, you should also add dates, durations, dependencies, and initial resource assignments. The project schedule consists of any elements in the Work Breakdown Structure that exist below the project level in the hierarchy, such as phases, tasks, and activities as well as dates, durations, and categorizations. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Estimate project costs and benefits |
Capture a high-level estimate of the costs and benefits to deliver the project in the work financial plan based on the need of your organization. Cost accounts can include labor, capital spending, and expense spending. For more information see the Financial Planning and Cost Management. |
Project Governance Process Steps
This provides a process and governance structure for progressing projects through an approval lifecycle into execution/delivery, ensuring that decisions are made by the right people and are based on structured data for each project entity.
Project governance process flow
| Process Step | Description |
|---|---|
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Governance point A |
Request intake information is reviewed. If approved, new projects or programs will be created. |
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Governance point B |
Initial project planning information, such as description and categorization attributes, cost and benefit estimates, and roadmap dates, will be captured and reviewed to determine if enough is known to proceed with the project and include in the detailed portfolio planning process. |
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Governance point C |
The process of investment planning allows planners to prioritize and analyze the list of proposed investments (projects) to determine which to move forward with. Analysis of investments is achieved by comparing what’s available, capacity (which can be in the form of resource capacity or financial a budget against what is required) versus demand (derived by the forecast of projects in the portfolio). Planners will create and compare a number of investment planning scenarios to model different investment decisions and various approaches to balancing investment demand with capacity. Once an approach is chosen, these decisions will be published as the agreed portfolio plan. |
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Governance point D |
If required, projects can proceed through a gated governance process. Usually, each gate requires the project to comply with a checklist of activities/deliverables before proceeding to the next gate. |
Business Requests Process Steps
This supports a clearly-defined process to initiate a business request, including collecting relevant categorization/scoring information and initial financial data.
Business requests process flow
| Process Step | Description |
|---|---|
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Create request for new project |
New project requests provide one way that project work can be initiated in Clarizen One. It is an opportunity to ensure that the incoming work requests are well defined, categorized, and assigned to the right area(s) for delivery. This also allows program requests to be evaluated against each other to compare scoring, impacts, and alignment. When a new request is created, certain fields will be required to ensure the data needed for appropriate categorization is provided. Request assignment and any lifecycle steps will start following your defined governance process. Relevant users will receive notifications via Discussions and/or email. Requests can be initiated from the Requests module, as well as using a web form or email. For more information, see IT Request Intake. |
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Submit request for approval |
The request must be assigned or reassigned to the relevant approval authority to gain approval from within your organization's governance structure. The user(s) assigned may take an action to approve the request, seek more information, or reject the request. When taking an action, the owner of the request will be notified via Discussions. |
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Convert to project |
Once the project has been approved, it may be converted into a project. The originating request and project will be related. The request owner and project manager will be notified via Discussions. |
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Close request |
If approval is not granted or the request is no longer needed, close the request. This provides a record of its status for reporting and ensures that no further updates can be made to the request. |
Demand Management Process Steps
This supports the creation of new work/projects and the entry of descriptive and categorization information.
All work is centralized and can be tracked and reported on through various statuses.
Demand management process flow
| Process Step | Description |
|---|---|
|
Create project |
A project is the basic level where work is planned. It contains units of work in the form of tasks, financial information, timelines, roadmaps, baselines, and other information needed for a project to be successful. New projects can be converted from new project requests or by creating a new project in the Projects module. When a new project is created, certain fields will be required to ensure the data needed for appropriate categorization is provided. Project assignment and any lifecycle steps will start following your defined governance process. Relevant users will receive notifications via Discussions and/or email. For more information, see the following articles: |
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Plan high-level schedule dates and milestones |
Building out the Work Breakdown Structure allows a Project Manager to form a high-level project schedule. As part of this step, you should also add dates, durations, dependencies, and initial resource assignments. The project schedule consists of any elements in the work breakdown structure that exist below the project level in the hierarchy, such as phases, tasks, and activities as well as dates, durations, and categorizations. For more information, see the following videos: |
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Estimate project costs and benefits |
In this step you can capture a high-level estimate of the costs and benefits to deliver the project in the work financial plan based on the need of your organization, cost accounts can include labor, capital spending, and expense spending. For more information see Financial Planning and Cost Management. |
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Review and approval |
Once the project has a schedule, roadmap, and financials in place, the final step is submitting your project to the relevant governing body for review. Once approved, the project's lifecycle state should be updated from draft to active, which will also activate all of the tasks living within the project. For more information, see Case Assignment and Lifecycle. |
Project Governance Process Steps
This provides a process and governance structure for progressing projects through an approval lifecycle into execution/delivery, ensuring that decisions are made by the right people and are based on structured data for each project entity.
Project governance process flow
| Process Step | Description |
|---|---|
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Governance point A |
At this potential governance point, the request intake information is reviewed and, if approved, new projects or programs will be created. |
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Governance point B |
At this potential governance point, the initial project planning information, such as description and categorization attributes, cost and benefit estimates, and roadmap dates, will be captured and reviewed to determine if enough is known to proceed with the project. |
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Governance point C |
At this potential governance point, the project goes through a process of analyzing proposed investments (projects) to determine which to move forward with, typically based on resource capacity and finances. For more information see Financial Planning and Cost Management. |
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Governance point D |
If required, projects can proceed through a gated governance process. Usually, each gate requires the project to comply with a checklist of activities/deliverables before proceeding to the next gate. For more information see Work Management. |
Related Capabilities
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Supported Solutions