Program Management for Improved Business Results

Part III. Program Management Metrics and Tools

Part II explained how program managers navigate programs through the phases of the PLC with the use of proven practices and processes. Even though these practices and processes are revealing, they don't constitute the whole picture for one reason: They don't include program management tools and performance measures that help to implement the practices and processes. Part III explains how performance measures and tools enable the effective execution of program management practices and processes.

In Chapter 9, we will shed light on performance measures that we term metrics for program management. Their intent is to focus attention on the business results of the organization and serve as the critical success factors in programs and projects. Given both their strategic and tactical nature, we emphasize the need to carefully engineer and install metrics. This means that they are compatible (or mutually aligned), balanced, consistently implemented, and tiered.

To help visualize a system of metrics and how they are tiered, we offer the Program Management Value Pyramid, which includes the following four levels:

• Strategic management metrics

• Program portfolio management metrics

• Program management metrics

• Project management and team execution metrics

The pyramid helps integrate the four levels and guide business improvement efforts. We stress the point that each company should develop a menu of metrics that respond to its own specific situation. Metrics ...