A prominent Optimize product feature is a selection of which processes, product activities, and projects to implement. The Optimize product determines the ranking for every process, product, and project using 32 built-in criteria. In addition, Portfolio Managers can add a criterion. The built-in criteria are:

Alignment with Organization Goals

Negative Consequences

Alignment with Process Goals

Possible Future Business

Alignment with Product Goals

Process Enabler

Alignment with Project Goals

Product Enabler

Available Expertise

Project Enabler

Cash Flow

ROI Year 1

Competitive Advantage

ROI Year 2

Conformance

ROI Year 3

Contract Size

Schedule Risk

Cost

Security

Enabler

Success Factor

External Contract

Synergy with Organization

Financial Risk

Synergy with Process

Future Business

Synergy with Product

Government Regulations

Synergy with Project

Management Risk

Technical Risk

Associated with each criterion is an essential factor (weight). The weight determines how vital the criterion is relative to another criterion. The Optimize product uses weights from zero to ten, with ten being the most important. A zero weight for a criterion eliminates it from the ranking process. An organization’s Portfolio Managers to determine the importance (weight) of each criterion. Portfolio Managers (Process, Product, and Project) select one or more evaluators for each criterion for a set of processes, products, and projects. It is the evaluators’ responsibility to give a score to their assigned processes, products, and projects and to adjust their scores when the environment changes for their assigned process, product, or project.

The process, product, or project with the highest total, becomes the organization’s most important activity. The tasks within each process, product, and project inherit the process’s, product’s, and project’s ranking. This continuous ranking allows the Optimize product and Managers to know the most critical task the organization is working on every day. There are several caveats. (1) A process, product, or project task that affects when the process, product, or project tasks are completed is a critical path task. Critical path tasks have an additive ranking factor. (2) A Business Analyst, Process Control Manager, Product Control Manager, Project Manager, Process Control Portfolio Manager, Product Control Portfolio Manager, and a Project Portfolio Manager can designate a parent requirement to have a “requirement additive factor.” A process, product activity, project, and issue’s ranking are a crucial ingredient of the Optimized component’s patented resource allocation algorithm and for an organization to assure their processes, products, and projects are delivered on time.