It may be a cliché to say that people are your most important asset, but when it comes to Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM), that’s exactly what they are.  So far, we’ve considered the different ways work gets done, the different models for delivering on strategy, and the need to continuously adjust and adapt your plans to shifting circumstances and emerging opportunities.  But regardless of how well any of that happens, you only deliver through the work that people do.

It doesn’t matter what industry you are in, how much you have embraced technology and automation, or how big your portfolio is.  The single biggest contributor to your success – or failure – is the ability to have the right people with the right skills and information doing the right work at the right time.  It’s also the element of SPM that should be the easiest to manage effectively, as it’s one of the few variables that you actually have the ability to control.  Those resources are employees, contractors or vendors to your business and are invested in your success in one way or another.

The challenge of allocating the right people to the right work

But you know that’s not how things work out.  You’ll have resource bottlenecks caused by overallocations and single points of expertise.  Some team members will be under-allocated resulting in lost opportunities and reduced performance levels.  And it’s not easy to project when demand will shift, making it a challenge to have the right people consistently available when they are needed.  And now that challenge is getting even bigger.  The tri-modal reality is making it even harder to effectively manage resources.  Resource management software helps you deal with allocations across permanent teams, role specific requests and hybrid approaches with predictability.

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