Project Management

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Are all your projects aligned with organization’s strategic goals?

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Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO Sarasota, FL, United States, United States
Some organizations initiate projects to fulfill current business needs, others initiate projects only if they are aligned with strategic goals. Are all of your new/approved projects 100% aligned with organization’s strategic goals?
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Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO Sarasota, FL, United States, United States
Feb 22, 2019 5:59 PM
Replying to Sergio Luis Conte
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With all my due respect please let me say that your statement is wrong or has no consistence. Not be upset with me and take into account that english is not my first language. I will explain. First of all, an organization is an open (interacts with the environment) and adaptable (changes when the environment changes) system. Interactions demands to answer to environmental stimuli. Strategy is the way that organizations answer to environmental stimuli. When organizations interact with the environment business needs appears due to those needs are created by to put in place the right strategy into action to answer to the stimuli. The way to put strategy into action is to start a project. So, by definition, is impossible to have a project that was not aligned to strategy. There is a close relation between strategy, needs and projects. As you know, "impossible is nothing" and because of that new roles like business analyst or BRM are created to address those type of things.
Thank you.
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Deepesh Rammoorthy ICT Project Manager ( PMP®AgilePM®Certified ScrumMaster® (CSM®))| Australian Red Cross Blood Service Tarneit, Vic, Australia
If you took a point in time snapshot , I would say you may see several projects and programs out of alignment with strategic goals

Sometimes, Looking ahead a number of years (3-5) A company may create a Strategic Program of work and Tactical Initiatives may be spawned to fulfill that Strategic Program of work. But partly into execution or after finishing a tactical piece of work , the strategy might change so the tactical initiative no longer is in alignment with it .

Therefore, like some of my colleagues said , There is a conscious effort of every company to align anything it does in terms of projects to it's strategic goals but in practice, it is very hard to achieve the perfect alignment.
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1 reply by Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO
Feb 25, 2019 9:08 AM
Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO
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Thank you.
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Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO Sarasota, FL, United States, United States
Feb 24, 2019 11:56 PM
Replying to Deepesh Rammoorthy
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If you took a point in time snapshot , I would say you may see several projects and programs out of alignment with strategic goals

Sometimes, Looking ahead a number of years (3-5) A company may create a Strategic Program of work and Tactical Initiatives may be spawned to fulfill that Strategic Program of work. But partly into execution or after finishing a tactical piece of work , the strategy might change so the tactical initiative no longer is in alignment with it .

Therefore, like some of my colleagues said , There is a conscious effort of every company to align anything it does in terms of projects to it's strategic goals but in practice, it is very hard to achieve the perfect alignment.
Thank you.
avatar
Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO Sarasota, FL, United States, United States
Feb 23, 2019 5:22 AM
Replying to Thomas Walenta
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In my experience with companies: the answer to your question is clearly no.

Many do not have a viable communicated strategy, so delivery and planning are not linked. 80% of strategic projects fail and selection is not done based on strategic goals.
Many do not even know how many projects they run.
The competitive mindset on the C-level leads to hiding projects, flawed business cases and pet-projects.
Sometimes projects are labeled X and creating Y.
Thank you.
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Tim Podesta Director of PM/PMO| Former BP- now Independent Penn, Bucks, United Kingdom
My experience is 50/50 - half of projects are strategic in nature the other are meeting a more operational need. The test is that any operational project must not out of line with strategy, whereas strategic projects need to be 100% aligned to delivering strategy.
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1 reply by Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO
Feb 27, 2019 7:24 AM
Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO
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Thank you.
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Anton Oosthuizen Senior Business Analyst / Project Manager| Self Employed Pretoria, Gauteng, South Africa
In theory, no project should be initiated without aligning with a goal, strategic or otherwise. But the practice is often quite different hence your question. Like Tim I would say 50/50, or even less strategic alignment. I found that immediate needs are very often the driving force behind projects. While the projects might seem to be fairly successful the resulting lifespan of the product/solution is significantly shorter than if there was proper alignment.

BTW a major reason why strategic alignment is being left behind is because cloud based SaaS are opening doors to business that were previously not there (because agile strategy is struggling to catch up). They can now implement fast, fail fast and learn fast at a fraction of the cost of what it would cost to ensure strategic alignment.
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1 reply by Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO
Feb 27, 2019 7:24 AM
Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO
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Thank you.
avatar
Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO Sarasota, FL, United States, United States
Feb 27, 2019 6:00 AM
Replying to Tim Podesta
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My experience is 50/50 - half of projects are strategic in nature the other are meeting a more operational need. The test is that any operational project must not out of line with strategy, whereas strategic projects need to be 100% aligned to delivering strategy.
Thank you.
avatar
Liliya Sablukova, MBA, PMP, CGFO Sarasota, FL, United States, United States
Feb 27, 2019 6:58 AM
Replying to Anton Oosthuizen
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In theory, no project should be initiated without aligning with a goal, strategic or otherwise. But the practice is often quite different hence your question. Like Tim I would say 50/50, or even less strategic alignment. I found that immediate needs are very often the driving force behind projects. While the projects might seem to be fairly successful the resulting lifespan of the product/solution is significantly shorter than if there was proper alignment.

BTW a major reason why strategic alignment is being left behind is because cloud based SaaS are opening doors to business that were previously not there (because agile strategy is struggling to catch up). They can now implement fast, fail fast and learn fast at a fraction of the cost of what it would cost to ensure strategic alignment.
Thank you.
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