P5.express uses a cyclical system to make the portfolio management activities more straightforward and regular. There are biannual, monthly, and daily cycles, each focusing on one aspect of portfolio management activities.
In addition to the process, there are 5 portfolio management documents (portfolio description, value generation matrix, global follow-up register, global health register, and business cases) and two roles (portfolio board and portfolio manager).
Biannual Cycle
- X1 — Evaluate the generated strategic value
- X2 — Optimize and balance the value generation strategy
- X3 — Conduct a focused communication
Monthly Cycle
- Y1 — Evaluate portfolio stakeholder satisfaction
- Y2 — Evaluate the ongoing programs and projects
- Y3 — Plan improvements
- Y4 — Conduct a focused communication
Daily Cycle
- Z1 — Manage follow-up items
- Z2 — Start, stop, or pause programs and projects
- Z3 — Balance resources
Processes
I would make it more explicit that an initiative in the portfolio contributes to the strategic objectives and that’s more than adding projects with a strategic value (benefit ÷ investment).
Unclear for me is what is meant by “Each domain should have a relative target, and the sum of the strategic values from all programs and projects in a balancing horizon should more or less match that target. By default, the balancing horizon is the upcoming cycle plus three previous cycles.” What if a finished project didn’t deliver the projected benefit?
I don’t understand why the satisfaction surveys to the portfolio board members the program and project managers must be anonymous. This makes follow-up discussions much more difficult.
On several places an exceptional Biannual Cycle is mentioned. A process to facilitate a periodic escalation possibility would make sense.
I don’t believe that balance resources daily make sense. This will facilitate multi-tasking, firefighting, suggests dynamic resourcing, and will slow down portfolio delivery.
Management products
Looking at the five artifacts the guide is in my opinion too superficial. The value generation matrix sounds promising, but the guide explains that it lists programs and standalone projects on one dimension and their information on the other. Nothing more. I would expect at least some information regarding prioritization, value definition, contribution to strategic objectives, et cetera. In the process paragraphs you can find some attributes.
The global follow-up register is a list of risks, issues, change requests, improvement plans, and lessons learned that impact multiple programs or projects.
The global health register stores the results of the stakeholder satisfaction evaluations. But what are we asking? Status project, delivered value, contribution the strategic objectives, et cetera?
Comparison P5.express with Portfolio management agility model
If I compare the guide with the model in the book Agile Portfolio Management – The bridge to strategic agility, I see this guide as an example of plan-based portfolio management. (Bi)annual portfolio horizon, resource allocation, output-driven (%-complete, time, cost forecast), fixed strategy, validation mostly after finishing initiatives, hierarchical decision-making structure, fixed execution, some focus on growth, and annual evaluation.
Henny Portman's Blog 