Portfolio flow for measurable outcomes

Building on our first and second articles about organising strategic objectives around value and enabling dynamic, lean budgeting, we now focus on how to ensure these ambitions and budgets lead to tangible outcomes. Achieving this requires a lean portfolio approach that connects strategy to execution from end to end.

As already discussed, even the best strategies and leanest budgets are only as effective as their execution. Simply launching new initiatives and assessing progress based on annual cycles isn’t sufficient. Organisations also have to steer them dynamically and measure their impact continuously.

A hybrid, lean and value-driven approach to portfolio management entails a portfolio kanban and iterative steering. This makes sure that every step, from idea to delivery, is transparent, adaptive and focused on measurable outcomes.

While organisations may excel at defining strategic ambitions and allocating resources, the real test comes during execution. This is where portfolios often encounter shifting priorities, fragmented oversight and difficulty maintaining transparency across initiatives. In a rapidly changing environment, the challenge is to keep every project aligned with business goals, ensure adaptability throughout delivery and establish clear mechanisms for tracking progress and outcomes. If these conditions aren’t met, even the best-designed strategies and budgets fall short of delivering sustained value.

To address execution challenges, organisations should establish transparent workflows, such as a portfolio kanban, to visualise and manage work packages across the portfolio. It’s equally important to embed clear metrics and dashboards that track progress and outcomes at every stage, enabling continuous steering and alignment with strategic goals.

Factors to consider when setting up a hybrid, lean and value-driven portfolio management function

In this article, we zoom in on the fifth and sixth steps in the sequence:

Execution of deliverables 

Executing work packages within a hybrid, lean and value-driven portfolio means ensuring the right flow of these work packages. This is managed via a portfolio kanban. The workflow begins with the funnel stage, where ideas are collected and evaluated for their potential as epics (an epic is a large piece of work that can be broken down into smaller features and user stories spanning multiple iterations). Under a lean and value-driven approach, stakeholders then collaborate to define a respective epic hypothesis statement containing a brief description, measurable benefits and an estimate of preliminary costs. This is known as the reviewing phase.

Once an epic passes a predetermined threshold, the lean portfolio management, in coordination with the relevant teams and stakeholders, assigns a suitable epic owner based on the area of expertise and business mission. This is typically done at a recurring committee meeting such as a monthly portfolio sync where portfolio progress is advanced. In the analysing phase, the epic owner collaborates with stakeholders and internal teams to develop a lean business case. This includes defining the minimum viable product (MVP), the relevant scope, expected costs, anticipated returns, and the development strategy. The go/no-go decision is made by the lean portfolio management governance function, ensuring that only value-driven initiatives proceed.

Approved epics enter the ready and implementing stages. At this stage, participatory budgeting secures funding and agile teams work on development. The MVP is built and validated against the original hypothesis. Applying the iterative nature of the lean startup cycle, if significant changes are required, the epic may pivot back to earlier stages for re-evaluation.

An epic is marked as “Done” when its hypothesis has been validated and the lean portfolio management function has accepted it. The portfolio kanban review may occur ad hoc or be integrated into existing committees such as the portfolio syncs. In parallel, organisations may choose to run traditional projects where requirements are fixed, such as in regulatory contexts. In these cases, a more extensive initiation phase is conducted to elaborate a detailed business case, which is then executed according to agreed time, cost and budget parameters.

Measuring & steering 

Effective lean portfolio management relies on robust measurement and active steering to ensure that strategy translates into real value. Throughout all stages of the portfolio cycle, measuring and steering outcomes are key. The enterprise strategy is translated into measurable objectives and key results (OKRs), which are then broken down into concrete initiatives. These initiatives are pursued within development value streams, each with specific KPIs and tied to relevant investment horizons. As initiatives are prioritised and lean business cases are developed, KPIs are specified for each work package, making expected outcomes explicit and ensuring resource allocation is focused on measurable impact. Throughout the iterations of execution, progress is tracked via portfolio kanban, with KPIs monitored at the epic level (features are managed at the program level) to make sure delivery remains on target and responsive to change. Measurement and steering are anchored in quarterly strategic reviews, which assess whether overall progress aligns with the portfolio’s investment mix and architectural runway.

This process is supported by a clear governance structure, with enterprise executives, enterprise architect, epic owners and business owners collaborating to set direction, allocate resources and ensure operational coordination with delivery teams. The lean portfolio management function, supported by a value management office (VMO) and a lean-agile centre of excellence (LACE), maintains the vital link between strategic direction and agile portfolio operations. This ensures that measurement and steering are not static, but adapt dynamically to performance insights and evolving priorities.