Organizations should run fewer initiatives than they can imagine. Keep candidate ownership and status visible in Tasks, and use Analytics as evidence only after a pilot has produced real usage. Every active initiative consumes business ownership, user attention, IT and security cooperation, testing capacity, and change-management effort.
Score With Evidence
Use a simple 1–5 score, but require a short evidence note for every value.
| Criterion | Question | High-priority signal |
|---|---|---|
| Business value | Will it improve an important outcome? | Clear, measurable impact |
| User demand | Do target users actively need it? | Named users and workflow pull |
| Feasibility | Are Data, access, connections, and owners available? | Realistic first version |
| Adoption | Will it fit the way people work? | Clear users, training, and support |
| Strategic fit | Does it support an agreed priority? | Sponsor and roadmap alignment |
| Complexity | Is the expected value proportionate to effort? | Small bounded pilot |
| Risk | Are consequences and controls understood? | Manageable, reviewable impact |
Do not let a high total compensate for an unacceptable risk, missing owner, or unavailable data. Treat these as gates.
Choose a Portfolio
Maintain three states:
- Active: funded, owned, and within current delivery capacity.
- Next: sufficiently defined but waiting for capacity or a dependency.
- Explore: useful idea that needs discovery before it can be ranked.
Limit active work until each initiative has time for realistic testing and feedback. Starting ten pilots and finishing none provides less evidence than completing two well-governed pilots.
Make the Decision Visible
For each candidate, record the score, evidence, blocking gates, decision owner, status, and next review date. Revisit prioritization when business conditions, source availability, policy, or delivery capacity changes.
Approved candidates move into the Initiative Lifecycle and Governance.