Clone of Organization Roles
Organization Roles
The LPM team integrates a broad range of perspectives to refine objectives, product strategy, execution plans, system health/growth, and customer management. It is composed of the subject matter experts and stakeholders empowered to make swift, well informed decisions. It can take a few iterations to strike the right balance between the number of people and perspectives - nobody wants a 40 person LPM team. The main focus of this team is to focus portfolio prioritization on achieving broad objectives, defining and measuring short and long feedback loops and dynamically steering into emergent opportunities and away from threats.
Values & Goals
Committed to the portfolio vision
Demonstrates commitment & responsibility
Proactively acts & communicates
Willing to learn & grow
Challenges the status quo if appropriate
Economic & Customer focused
Conscious Leader
Leads by example & mentorship
Systems thinking
Product & Impact
Design & discovery prototyping
Metrics for competitive advantage
Contributes to OKRs & prioritization
Enrich investment opportunities
Contributes to roadmaps
Leadership & Culture
Shares responsibility toward portfolio goal
Embodies portfolio culture
Creates a feeling of safety
Shares best practices
Innovation & Growth culture
Business & tech partnership
Supports people emerging needs
Empowers and enables
Markets & Environment
Lean budgeting
Improves portfolio standards
Enables optimal flow
Evolves roles & responsibilities
Follows market trends
Incentivizes performance & collaboration
Systemic innovation
Portfolio Owner
The Portfolio owner is the captain of the ship, taking in all perspectives and making key decisions to lead the organization to successfully achieving the portfolio objectives. Deep partnership and trusting relationships are essential with their technical and operational partners, and their Lean Portfolio management team as a whole. The Portfolio owner owns and embodies the vision and inspires others to invest their full talents and energy. In a large enterprise, Portfolio Owners work with other Portfolio Owners to align objectives to enterprise OKRs during annual and quarterly planning.
Values & Goals
Result Oriented
Rapid decision making
Collaborative
Deep understanding of the market & customer needs
Inspirational Leader
Motivator
Visionary
Creative
Challenges status Quo
Entrepreneurial mindset
Product & Impact
Defines/approves products
Owns KPIs - OKRs ROI, etc.
Creates Initiatives with their team
Manages Portfolio Kanban
Defines the vision and the who
Owns Portfolio results
Prioritize towards strategic deadlines
Owns Profit and Loss
Responsible for legal
Leadership & Culture
Coordinate with other Portfolio Owners
Inspires people to take on the vision
Mentoring
Listens to Ideas
Integrates multiple perspectives
Gives and receives good feedback
Accountable to shareholders
Markets & Environment
Identifies Market Needs
Focus on competitive advantage
Owns the Business Value Streams
Portfolio Architect (Director of Operations/Value Chain)
If the Portfolio Owner is the captain of the ship, the Portfolio Architect is the Chief Engineer. The PA is responsible for the health and integrity of the systems through which value flows, and ensures all other engineers both follow and can contribute to architectural standards as new technologies and customer needs emerge. As technology leaders in their organization, it’s important to have open, frequent communication with other architects and create a culture of trust and empowerment to decentralize decision making. Portfolio Architects continuously walk a tightrope, balancing the needs of their platforms with the current and future needs of their business partners.
Values & Goals
Result Oriented
Rapid decision making
Collaborative
Familiarity with market & customer needs
Inspirational Leader
Motivator
Visionary
Creative
Challenges status Quo
Entrepreneurial mindset
Systemic design thinker
Flexible
Root cause focused
Product & Impact
Defines systems
Owns Performance & Standards
Creates Initiatives with their team
Prioritize towards strategic deadlines
Ensure Quality
Owns architectural runway
Owns system KPIs
Leads the effort to solve problems/outages
Leadership & Culture
Mentors
Train/teach the team
Provides clarity/confidence/guidance
Provides feedback
Collaborates/Aligns with other SMEs
Articulates future state
Markets & Environment
Identifies Market Needs
Focus on competitive advantage
Owns the Development Value Streams/Chains
Allows freedom within guard rails
Talent allocation/strategy
Manage budget
Defines uplift strategy
Manage tech debt
Automation
Integration of subsidiary systems
Responsible for compliance/regulatory
Portfolio Operations
Successful Agile transformations require a re-imagining of roles, career paths and incentive structures; this is where the HR leadership plays a key role. What is the career path for Scrum Masters and internal coaches? How can we change role definitions to better fit the Agile mindset? Do current incentive structures promote individual success over the success of the organization as a whole? Do current cultural norms support aspirational values needed to sustain the transformation? Without these structural changes, any process improvements will be undermined as habitual ways of working and relating re-establish themselves within the legacy culture.
Values & Goals
Organized
Strong Analytical skills
Discipled dynamic and flexible
Adaptable
Value/Impact mindset
Systemic mindset
Proactive communicator
Knows how the system works
Product & Impact
Utilization planning/projections
Documentation
Reporting
Facilitates transactions
Rapid decision making
Leadership & Culture
Negotiates with vendors
Guides people through the process
Collaborates to achieve enterprise goals
Educates others
Establishes working relationships with SMEs
Shepards people through the process
Markets & Environment
Manages budget
Vendor management
Compliance obligations
Contractual obligations
Owns financial and legal standards
Efficiency and process improvement
Stays ahead of new regulations
Stakeholder
Stakeholders working with the Portfolio Holon are very different from the stakeholders working with the holons below. At the Team and ToT Holons, the stakeholders tend to have a direct stake in the product or service being developed and (assuming they’re not external to the company) are often a part of the same Portfolio. When multiple Portfolios work together it becomes almost impossible to take any action without affecting the fortunes of other organizations across the enterprise. Involving impacted stakeholders from other Portfolios in the planning process is critical for avoiding friction and re-work down the road, and incentivizes them to involve your organization in areas that impact your success. This is a key element to softening silos and optimizing the flow of value across the enterprise.
Values & Goals
Engaged in the Agile process
Customer focused
Clear of purpose & direction
Value/Impact mindset
Systemic mindset
Proactive communicator
Product & Impact
Aligns OKRs
Rapid decision making
Invited to Demos
Provides artifacts (roadmaps, etc.)
Leadership & Culture
Collaborates to achieve enterprise goals
Gives constructive feedback
Trusts the Portfolio team
Negotiates to focus on highest value
Contributes knowledge
Markets & Environment
Uses long feedback loops to course correct
Stays ahead of the market
Aligns with enterprise objectives
Develops cross-portfolio strategies
Portfolio Coach
The coach working with the Portfolio Holon is focused primarily on achieving flow of value. This requires systematically mapping and observing the full system - people, teams, process and results - and focusing on areas where flow is impeded or stopped altogether. Resolving those impediments can be very challenging, in many cases the issues that need to be addressed can be deeply rooted in organizational culture and might have existed for years or even decades depending on the age of the organization. Working with leaders to make the incremental changes needed to achieve transformational results requires patience and understanding, and the support of other coaches (team & ToT) and other change agents throughout the portfolio.
Values & Goals
Servant Leader Mindset
Coach, Enabler
Agile expertise
Adaptable & flexible
Systems thinking
Proactive problem solver
Highly Organized
Negotiation/Conflict resolution
Responsible, accountable
Product & Impact
Initiative Intake
Empirical Observation of progress & improvement
Manages & configures the Agile tool
Promotes achievement mindset
Leads by example
Responsible for reporting
Leadership & Culture
Creates trust relationships with the team
- Safe, Collaborative environment
- Accountability & Integrity
Visibility & Transparency - Team & business
Motivates & inspires
Facilitates Objective (OKR) realization
Markets & Environment
Owns the process/methodology
Clear Impediments
Schedules & Facilitates meetings
Helps reorganize teams to promote flow
Creates an environment of success
Value Stream Mapping
Systemic transparency
Facilitates Lean Budgeting