Welcome to the Creating portfolios and programs section. Here are the core actions for creating a portfolios and programs in Portfolio IQ:
- Document charter and business case
- Capture key dates
- Identify stakeholders
- Add related programs/projects
Download Job Aid: Creating portfolios and program
Important: If you are not familiar with Portfolio IQ, we recommend you review the Portfolio IQ Overview page. It will provide you with a working knowledge of the Portfolio IQ area.
Portfolios and Programs have an abbreviated, and much less formal, life cycle which involves planning, executing, and closing. The focus at this stage to help you understand how to create portfolios or programs, including key dates and stakeholders, and associate the appropriate projects required to achieve the desired results.
Here are a few practical tips:
- Portfolio IQ allows you to combine projects into either portfolios or programs. This allows you to define and control the details at the project level while also enabling big picture management for larger initiatives.
- First, let us understand the difference between a portfolio and a program. Portfolio IQ is based on the Project Management Institute’s (PMI) definitions, so:
٠ A Portfolio involves identifying, prioritizing, authorizing, managing, and controlling projects, programs, and other related work, to achieve specific strategic business objectives.
٠ A Program can either be stand-alone program of work or a group of related projects managed in a coordinated way to obtain benefits and control not available from managing them individually.
٠ Or to rephrase that as defined in Portfolio IQ, a Portfolio is a collection of programs and projects which help deliver a strategic business objective.
٠ Therefore, a Portfolio is designed to be dynamic with no defined financial or schedule constraints; and a Program can be a collection of projects which deliver a specific result, and therefore does have defined financial and schedule constraints.
- Creating a new portfolio or program is as simple as giving it a name and capturing relevant high-level information. In the case of a portfolio, you capture the high-level details from the charter, and for a program you capture the high-level details from the business case.
- Next you capture the key dates relevant to the portfolio or program, recognizing that the individual projects also will have key dates specific to each project, which then roll up to the portfolio or program.
- Recognizing that the portfolio and programs will likely have a unique set of stakeholders, you can define the stakeholders and their interest in the portfolio or program.
- And finally, and probably most importantly, you create the appropriate associations of portfolios, programs, and projects to enable the oversight of these larger initiatives.
Disclaimer: Some images in the instructional video and text instructions contained herein may appear different from (or not available) in your organization’s Sensei IQ instance due to specific custom configurations and/or continuous solution updates. Ensure that you are already an enabled user in the Sensei.IQ for Project application and check out the What’s New page. Contact your system administrator for any assistance.