Capture strategic alignment information

Portfolio managers define strategic themes at the portfolio level, and managers or submitters of portfolio initiatives align them with strategic themes.

Overview of strategic themes

Strategic themes are the pillars that support the portfolio strategy. They are the main, high-level strategic focus areas of your organization. Strategic themes connect the evolving enterprise business strategy to the portfolio vision which is then inherited by the portfolio contents.

To use strategic themes, you must enable this feature by setting the ENABLE_STRATEGIC_THEMES parameter to true.

Note: The term "Strategic Themes" may have a different name in your organization, for example "Business Outcomes". This occurs if the PPM admin renames “Strategic Themes” by updating the validation "PFM - Strategic Themes Labels". Changes take effect on every PPM menu and label.

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Define strategic themes

This section describes how to define strategic themes for your portfolio.

Add strategic themes

You can add strategic themes to your portfolio by adding a global or parent portfolio's strategic theme, or by creating a new strategic theme in your portfolio.

To add strategic themes to a portfolio:

Prerequisite: The use of strategic theme is enabled (by setting the ENABLE_STRATEGIC_THEMES parameter to true).

  1. Open the portfolio Strategy tab.

  2. Click Strategic Themes & Business Goals, and then use the following options to add strategic themes to your portfolio.

    If the portfolio has inherited strategic themes from its portfolio type, these strategic themes are listed in this page. For details, see Set strategic themes and business goals for portfolio types.

    Option Description
    Add a global strategic theme

    To add a global strategic theme to your portfolio:

    1. Click + > Add From > Global Strategic Themes.

    2. All the active global strategic themes are listed for selection.

      Use the Search box at the upper-right corner if you know the name of the strategic theme or you want to search for one or more strategic themes that have a particular phrase or fragment of text in its name.

    3. Select the target strategic themes and click Copy.

    1. Prerequisite: You must have the Edit All Portfolios access grant.

    2. From the PPM menu, select Open > Administration > Portfolio Management > Manage Global Strategic Themes.
    3. Click Add.
    4. Provide name, status, owner, and description for the global strategic theme.

    5. Select a color for the strategic theme.

      You can use the color to quickly distinguish between strategic themes.

    6. Click Add.
    7. To adjust the ranking of a strategic theme, make sure the strategic themes are sorted by the ranking order, and then drag and drop it to the target place.
    Add a parent portfolio's strategic theme

    Available only when your portfolio has a parent portfolio.

    To add a parent portfolio's strategic theme to your portfolio:

    1. Click + > Add From > Parent Portfolio's Strategic Themes.

    2. All the active strategic themes that are currently used by the parent portfolio are listed for selection.

      Use the Search box at the upper-right corner if you know the name of the strategic theme or you want to search for one or more strategic themes that have a particular phrase or fragment of text in its name.

    3. Select the target strategic themes and click Copy.

    Add a new strategic theme in your portfolio

    To create a new strategic theme:

    1. Click + > Add New > Strategic Theme.

    2. Provide the name, status, owner, and description for the strategic theme.

    3. To help distinguish the strategic themes from others, select a color.

    4. Click Add to add the strategic theme, or Add & Another to continue adding another strategic theme.

    5. To adjust the ranking of a strategic theme, make sure the strategic themes are sorted by the ranking order, and then drag and drop the strategic theme to the target place.

Edit strategic themes

To edit a strategic theme:

  1. Open a portfolio and go to the Strategy tab.

  2. Click Strategic Themes & Business Goals and then click the target strategic theme link.

  3. In the strategic theme details page, make the changes in the relevant fields.

  4. (Optional) Sync strategic theme from its source. When the strategic theme is out of sync with the source, the Sync from Source option becomes enabled.

    When you click Sync from Source, the following happens:

    • The current strategic theme is synchronized from the source.
    • For the portfolio contents aligned with this strategic theme, the strategic theme are synchronized in the content details page.

  5. (Optional) If you find the following message, it means the strategic theme is deleted from the source or the current portfolio is no longer the subportfolio of the source. You can click the link in the message to update the source of the strategic theme to "This portfolio".

  6. Click Save.

Remove a strategic theme

To remove a strategic theme:

  1. In the strategic themes list, select the target strategic theme.
  2. Click and then click Yes to confirm.

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View strategic themes

You can view strategic themes from the strategic themes list, the strategic theme details page, or the Strategy Map tab, as described in the following table:

From Details

Strategic themes list

The strategic themes list provides the following information:

  • The name, status, rank and owner of each strategic theme.
  • If a strategic theme has business goals related to it, an icon appears. Click to view the related business goals, as well as the general information and performance of each business goal.

To open the strategic themes list, at the top of the Strategy tab, click Strategic Themes & Business Goals.

Strategic theme details page

 

The strategic theme details page lets you drill down into the details of a specific strategic theme.

To open a strategic theme's details page:

  1. At the top of the Strategy tab, click Strategic Themes & Business Goals.
  2. Click the target strategic theme name link to open its details page.

The strategic theme details page includes the following sections:

  • General. Displays the general information of strategic theme.
  • Strategy in Portfolio. Displays the strategic theme ratio in terms of costs and resources. For details, see Drive strategic alignment.
  • Business Goals. Lists the business goals that are related to the strategic theme, as well as the general information and performance of each business goal.
  • Linked to Items. Lists the initiatives that are aligned with the strategic theme. Clicking the initiative name link opens its details page. For details, see Align initiatives with strategic themes.

Strategy Map

The Strategy Map shows a portfolio's strategic alignment with global strategic themes, its parent portfolio, and subportfolios.

  • To view the strategy map, at the top of the Strategy tab, click Strategy Map. You can display the strategy map in the Horizontal structure or the Vertical structure .

  • To view the details of a specific strategic theme, click the strategic theme card.

    Note: Only the current portfolio's strategic themes are clickable.

  • To view the source strategic themes from which the current portfolio's strategic themes are copied, refer to the left part in the Horizontal structure or the top part in the Vertical structure.

  • To view the strategic themes that are inherited by the immediate subportfolios, refer to the right part in the Horizontal structure or the bottom part in the Vertical structure.

    If a strategic theme is inherited by the next levels of the subportfolios of the current portfolio, an expand button () appears on the strategic theme card. You can click the expand button to see the strategic themes that are inherited by all the levels of the subportfolios.

  • To view the business goals that are related a strategic theme, refer to the strategic theme card. When there are more than two business goals related to a strategic theme, an ellipsis appears.

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Align initiatives with strategic themes

Once strategic themes are defined in the portfolio level, the Strategy section is available in the details page of the portfolio initiatives. You can align a portfolio initiative with the portfolio's strategic theme in this section.

If an initiative is added to multiple portfolios, you can align the initiative with multiple strategic themes, one strategic theme per one portfolio.

To align a portfolio initiative with strategic themes:

  1. Locate the portfolio with whose strategic theme you want to align the initiative.
  2. In the Strategic Theme field, select one strategic theme for the portfolio initiative.

  3. Repeat these steps if you want to align the initiative with another portfolio's strategic theme.

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Drive strategic alignment

When portfolio initiatives are aligned with strategic themes, their forecast costs and resource demands are accordingly grouped by strategic themes.

The Forecast costs and Resources demand charts in the strategic theme details page demonstrate the strategic theme ratio in terms of costs and resources. You can refer to them regularly to see whether your portfolio is working for the right things in the portfolio planning and monitoring phases.

To view the Forecast costs and Resources demand charts:

  1. Open the portfolio Strategy tab and then click Strategic Themes & Business Goals.

  2. From the strategic themes list, click the target strategic theme to open the details page.

    You can find the Forecast costs and Resources demand charts in the Strategy in Portfolio section.

For details, see Strategic alignment.

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See also: