Prioritisation

1. Right Level

Are the items that you are prioritising the same type of things? For example, are they strategy items, initiatives, features, epics, or stories?

It's harder to prioritise items that aren't the same thing as we will consider the item's size or the dependencies, which are helpful for scheduling but should be avoided when discussing priority. See Step 3.

1. Right Team

Do you have the right people to make the decisions?

There is no point in making decisions if someone can override them after the fact. That is just a waste of time for everyone involved.

Some people say to avoid the "HIPPO" (Highest Paid Person's Opinion), but I think that they are often the one who knows what is best and at the end of the day, they can say no to the whole list - I've seen it happen too many times to discard it totally. The key is not to let groupthink happen - if you are facilitating the session, talk to the senior leaders beforehand and ask them to hold their opinions until the group has talked about an item. Most of all, ask senior leaders to listen to the rest of the group. They might change their opinion.

1. Right Criteria

This is probably the most challenging step. Decide as a group on the criteria for making decisions. It might be increasing revenue, decreasing costs, reducing risks, adhering to compliance, or improving customer value.

You might not be able to see all the data points that you want to include in the criteria at first—that is okay. Prioritisation is an iterative activity.

1. Right Method

Whether you use MoSCoW, Eisenhower matrix or any other model to create the list, the end goal should be to create a single stacked list. That means one number one, one number two, one number three, and so on. Insert Highlander quote here.

The end goal should be to create a single stacked list.

The first pass of the list might involve using the criteria to identify the "must-have" items. From that, we could use the Eisenhower matrix to categorise further. Finally, we could use a "formula" based on scores to determine the stacked list.

1. Right List

How you get to the stacked list doesn't matter as long as you end up with a list that the group agrees on. You must see all the work. Whether that is on a physical board or an online tool, it doesn't matter as long as everyone can see the whole list.

Like Project Management, prioritisation is about "no surprises." We want to make sure that we have reviewed all the work and made decisions based on the criteria that we have all agreed on.

If you don't, or there is a new item, the criteria are missing something, or something needs to be changed, then iterate.

Prioritisation is not a one-off thing. Part of being agile is listening and feeling what is going on around us, making decisions, and doing activities that help work within the changes and still help us move towards the goal.