Portfolio Sample
Purpose:
Illustrate how a decision matrix can be used and implemented to make the decision process less stressful and more productive.
Problem:
The client needed a way to logically and objectively make decisions. Historically decisions were not based on facts or logical methods. Debates imposed unproductive paths which did not ontribute to effective decisions.
Diagnosis:
This decision matrix was created with decision attributes which were found to be important based on the goal and objectives of the client. This was to evaluate the value of a COTS solution or upgrading an existing custom in-house solution.
Note: the attributes shown as the columns, can be viewed as generic attributes that could be used towards any product. The intention is to objectively determine value.
Colour codes helped to establish asset and liability association.
The legend to the far left indicates how levels are defined.
How it works:
Collectively the stakeholders work together as a group to find the assign priority (poker, or T-shirt sizing)
The negative values are subtracted from the positive values to produce the decision value, the item with the highest positive value wins the first place decision.
Sorting by descending order gets the 2, 3, 4 place items.
Attributes:
Liability
- (Financial) Est Financial Impact on Biz sm,med,lg
- (Customer Experience) Negative value received by customer
- (Resource) Negative effect On Staff
- (Financial) Negative Level of ROI
- (Scaleability) Scalability (cannot grow with the company)
- (Strategic) Does not serve objectives
Asset:
- (Effort) Simple effort of Implementation
- (Customer Value) Value Received By Customer
- (Value to Staff) Value Received By Staff
- (Financial) Level of ROI(Scalability) Scalability (can it grow with the company)
- (Strategic) High Impact towards objectives
Explanation:
Separating the attributes into positive and negative value allowed us to apply numeric assessment and find the overall value for each item.
Ratings:
- 1-3 = low
- 3-6 = medium
- 6-9 = large
It’s easier for those not familiar with the exercise to understand how something can be a small, medium, or large level of effort, and by converting these levels into a number range, the client ccould easily understand how to assess them.
Summary:
This approach and tool can be used for almost any item that requires a valued assessment. The attributes can be altered to fit the type of subject, in this case the client needed to find out if they should invest in their existing internal custom tool, or a COTS solution.
These attributes were defined by loosely referencing the balance score card approach.