Portfolio and Program Management Dashboards..Is there a difference?

Great post and replies. I would only add two things.

First, most folks view dashboarding as a way to provide an intuitive view of how things are going in a manner that presents the "least" amount of information to support the needs of the viewers of the dashboard, typically management and the leadership team. Please don't take this as condescending, but what you think or I think the dashboard should show is irrelevant. What is relevant is what the user (not provider) of the dashboards thinks. For example, the PMO of a very large Fortune 1000 firm that I know quite well actually reports to the COO, not the CIO. And, despite the fact that this company uses one of the leading high-end PPM applications, they actually do their Program Dashboards for the leadership team in PowerPoint and make them available via the Program Dashboard Page of the their PMO Best Practice Framework. These Program Dashboards are very high level, use RAG indicators, and speak to Program Overall Status, Cost Status, Schedule Status, Risk Status, Benefit Delivery Status, etc. And, for further insight into program component details, provided on the Program Dashboard is a link to the appropriate area of their PPM application. So, rather than dashboarding sub-component items, this detail is easily found. This can keep your dashboards simple. For example, if you have 15 programs that each have 10 component projects, that can be quite a bit of work to dashboard 150 components. And, let's say that your RAG indicators show 10 components going well (green), 3 components under cautionary status (amber), and 2 components under high alert (red). The odds are that the leadership team will only want (need) further information for the troubled Programs. Hence, from a Six Sigma (defect elimination) point of view, dashboarding all of the component projects would represent waste as this information is not needed. And, even when the leadership is made available some amount of component level dashboarding, they will no doubt want to see the details per the functional application, ie. the PPM tool or whatever tooling that is used by the Program Office. So, keep the dashboard as simple as possible. Provide what the user wants to see; this may or may not be the same thing as what the Program Office thinks is a good idea to provide just because they can and would like to. And, rather than overly complicate the dashboard, provide a link to the appropriate are of the PPM tool (or equivalent) to view further program and component details.

And second, I would just add that for many organizations, the terms program and portfolio management are used interchangeably and hence incorrectly. Getting back to the example of 15 programs each with 10 component projects, while there is typically a fixed relationship between the program and the program component, there is not necessarily a fixed relationship between the portfolio and its components. By that I mean for a given set of programs and projects, you can have multiple portfolio views. One view could portray the portfolio components by risk/return. Another could portray the portfolio by investment class, or by line of business, or by market segment, or by geography, or by business strategy, etc. The ability to present different views of the portfolio enable management and the leadership team to evaluate, prioritize, and balance and manage the portfolio amidst a variety of parameters. I just wanted to clarify this as many organizations see more value in executive dashboards when the dashboards provide these kinds of high-level insights into both Program Status and Portfolio Status as opposed to the other approach of proving a singular Program Status view with component project detail. Not knowing more of your organization, this may or may not be applicable. But, most executives would rather see high level status in a Program Dashboard accompanied by Portfolio Views aligned to the executive team's goals, objectives, and strategies. They don't need a duplication of detail that already exists in the PPM tool or equivalent.

Just a perspective. As always, I hope we hear and learn from others. ~ Mark