Move guide
Run the programme
Your report suggested a move on at least one of these four practices:
- whether a central team runs the programme and owns one set of numbers;
- how progress is reviewed;
- whether benefits are tracked with lead and lag measures;
- what happens when an initiative goes red.
This move guide sets up a small central team with one tracker. Weekly reviews look forward, and benefits are tracked against forecast every month. A red initiative is worked inside a week.
1. When it applies
Use this move guide if your report placed any of these four practices in the lowest two stages.
| Practice | Where it may sit today | Where this move guide aims |
|---|---|---|
| Whether a central team runs the programme and owns one set of numbers | Lagging: "There is no central team, every workstream reports its own way, and status lives in slide decks." Basic: "A programme office exists, but it either chases templates for the steering pack or does the initiatives' work itself, so everything waits on it." |
Competent: "A small central team, led by someone who does nothing else, keeps the one tracker that every initiative's status and benefits sit in." |
| How progress is reviewed | Lagging: "Progress is reviewed from backward-looking slides whenever someone calls a meeting, amber means someone was on leave, and decisions slip to the next one." Basic: "Reviews happen on a calendar but are status readouts; problems are noted and nothing is decided in the room." |
Competent: "Weekly workstream reviews ask what is late, broken or coming up next, and a monthly executive review makes decisions and records them." |
| Whether benefits are tracked with lead and lag measures | Lagging: "Benefits are asserted at the end of the year, and the answer to 'how do we know' is 'we'll see it in the results'." Basic: "Dollars are tracked by initiative on a spreadsheet updated when someone remembers, and there are no early-warning measures." |
Competent: "Forecast and actual benefits are tracked monthly by initiative against a hard baseline, and each initiative has one activity or adoption measure that moves before the dollars do." |
| What happens when an initiative goes red | Lagging: "A red initiative stays red for months, and the owner is blamed for it." Basic: "A red initiative gets a slide and a new date." |
Competent: "Within a week someone from the centre or the top team works the problem with the owner, and the decision (fix, resize, stop) is recorded." |
If all four already sit at the middle stage or higher, skip this move guide.
It runs from launch to the end of the programme, on the waves from sequencing the waves and banking early wins.
2. What to do
Five steps. Set them up at launch, then run them every week and every month.
- Stand up a small central team of the business's own people, led by someone who does nothing else. It keeps one tracker for every initiative. The transformation-office worksheet sets it up.
- Run weekly reviews that look forward. Ask what is late, what is blocked and who clears it. Hold a monthly executive review that makes decisions and records them. The review-cadence worksheet holds the agenda.
- Track each initiative's benefit against forecast every month, against a hard baseline. Give each one a lead measure that moves before the money does. The benefits-tracking worksheet does this.
- Work a red initiative inside a week. Someone from the centre or the top team works it with the owner. Decide to fix it, resize it or stop it, and record the decision. The troubleshooting worksheet holds the routine.
- Move each initiative through gates, as in the chart below. Each gate has its own sign-off.
Stages
- Idea
- Name the improvement
- Estimate the benefit
- Business case
- Cost and benefit
- Options and risks
- A plan to deliver
- Detailed plan
- Scope, timing and measures
- Roles, resources and risks
- Delivery
- Deliver against targets
- Report progress regularly
- Close
- Final report
- Benefits in the budget
Sign-off at each gate
- Idea to business case: Approval to analyse it further
- Business case to plan: The programme board approves the case
- Plan to delivery: The programme board approves the plan
- Delivery to close: The programme board signs off the close
Table A below holds one tracker line per initiative.
The four free worksheets do the recording:
- /worksheets/transformation/transformation-office for the central team and its tracker;
- /worksheets/transformation/review-cadence for the weekly and monthly reviews;
- /worksheets/transformation/benefits-tracking for forecast against actual, with a lead measure;
- /worksheets/transformation/troubleshooting for working a red initiative.
3. What to produce
One table, plus the four worksheets above.
Table A. The tracker
| Initiative | Gate | Status | Benefit forecast ($) | Benefit actual ($) | Lead measure, reading now | If red: decision and date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
A red line with no decision beside it is a problem nobody owns.
4. A worked example
Illustrative. Written for this move guide. It describes no client.
A hospital group's programme reports through four workstream decks, each in its own format. Amber usually means someone was away.
The office.
- A finance manager now leads a team of three, full time, with one tracker. Every initiative's status and benefit sits in it.
The reviews.
- Workstream reviews run every Monday and ask what is late or blocked. The monthly executive review records each decision in the tracker.
The benefits.
- Each initiative now has a lead measure. Theatre scheduling, for example, tracks the share of sessions booked a week ahead.
The red initiative.
- Procurement savings went red in the second month. Within a week, the chief financial officer and the owner resized it and set a new measure.
Two months on.
- 1 tracker, kept by a full-time team of three
- All initiatives with a lead measure
- 1 week from red to a recorded decision
On a retake, all four practices could be answered at the middle stage.
What it looked like in our work
From our own work. Redrawn.
An equipment maker's programme office reported each month on every initiative: its due date, its status and a line of comment. Beside it sat the benefits to date, against forecast.
| Initiative | Status | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Set up the programme office | Complete | Office running, and status reporting started |
| Overheads: research | Complete | |
| Overheads: sales and marketing | Complete | |
| Overheads: administration | On track | Most of the agreed reductions made |
| Overheads: manufacturing | On track | |
| Sale of a business line | On track | Interest from more than one party |
| Product range | Delayed | Key sales staff were not free to check the opportunity |
| Sales force effectiveness | On track | Needs clear baseline measures and tracking |
| Growth plan for a product line | Not started | Starts later in the year |
- Each month benefits to date against the forecast
- 3 causes for each month's variance: the programme, the underlying business, and other effects such as currency
The delayed line named its cause. The variance split showed which gaps belonged to the programme.
5. Effort and dependencies
- Programme office leadRuns the central team and keeps the tracker.
- Programme ownerChairs the monthly review and takes the red initiatives.
- Initiative managersReport weekly, with the lead measure.
What you need
- The waves and their dated benefits from sequencing the waves and banking early wins.
- The baseline from finding, defining and valuing the initiatives.
How long
- From launch to the end of the programme: weekly and monthly.
What gets in the way. We have seen these in our own work:
- Advisers as the office. An equipment maker's programme office was its adviser, about a day a week. The business owned the benefits, but not the office.
- What good looked like. The same business's monthly update showed benefits forecast against actual, and each leak named by initiative and cause.
6. How will you know it worked?
The test is the tracker and the decisions recorded in it. Retake the check after the third monthly review. Each of these should be true when you answer:
| Practice | You can answer Competent when | A document alone does not count if |
|---|---|---|
| Whether a central team runs the programme and owns one set of numbers | A small team, led by someone who does nothing else, keeps one tracker. | The tracker exists, but workstreams still report their own way. |
| How progress is reviewed | Weekly reviews look forward, and a monthly review makes and records decisions. | The reviews run, but they only read out status. |
| Whether benefits are tracked with lead and lag measures | Benefits are tracked monthly against a baseline, and each initiative has a lead measure. | The dollars are tracked, but nothing moves before them. |
| What happens when an initiative goes red | A red initiative is worked within a week, and the decision is recorded. | Red initiatives get a new date and nothing else. |
The worked example is illustrative.
Think we've used your work without proper credit? Tell us and we'll fix it.