There’s only one reason to engage in any piece of work – and that’s to achieve value.  Sometimes the value is direct – like more revenue or lower costs.  And sometimes it’s indirect – compliance, customer and employee satisfaction and the like.  But regardless of how value is defined, every piece of work do has to deliver more than is invested in it.  And in the vast majority of cases, what’s invested eventually comes down to money.

The problem is, not many people are focused on that money.  Teams within the tri-modal reality are focused on delivering solutions to their clients.  Resource owners are looking to understand when they will get their people back or when they will have to allocate others.  Project, program and product managers are juggling multiple priorities and challenges while trying to keep their work on track.  There’s a real risk that no one has their eyes on the ultimate prize – financial performance.

Becoming the CFO of your portfolio

Sure, executives are focused on the money, but they’re too far removed from the work to have contextualized insight on a daily basis – and besides, they have other priorities.  So financial governance of your portfolio has to live with the portfolio manager.  He or she has to become the CFO of the portfolio in addition to their other duties.  And that starts right up front, with control over how money is being allocated and spent.

Click here to read the previous post in this series, or start from the beginning