1, 2, 3 align your projects!

What are the steps involved in aligning projects to a strategy?

1. There are many different projects that a company can undertake. The first step is to create a list and make sure that everyone understands what each project is about.
   
2. Determine the criteria you will use. Your criteria should match your strategy and be representative of the direction you want your company to follow. For example, if you want to be a low cost provider, one of your potential criteria could be, "that a project should reduce the costs of service or increase the efficiency of providing service using your call centre."
   
3. Some things are more important than others. Weight your criteria.
4. Let the project sponsors individually score the importance of the projects using your criteria. Tabulate the results to reduce bias that the sponsors may have towards a one project or another. Projects that score high align more closely with your company's strategy and direction.
   
5. Establish high-med-low groups of projects.
   
6. The groupings and individual rankings form a basis for prioritizing.

By the end of this process you will have determined objectively which projects align better with your overall strategy and goals. Note that there are factors other than strategic fit that determine which projects will ultimately be undertaken (e.g., compliance, ROI.)