When to use
Run Quarterly Planning once a quarter, in the last week before the quarter starts, after every project has a milestone plan.
Roles
- Program Manager: leads. You run the agenda, keep time, own the dependency board and record decisions.
- Project Managers: present each project's milestone plan and its risks.
- Product Owners: present Home Team Discretionary priorities and confirm that each milestone plan is realistic for their team.
- Product Managers: answer scope and value questions, and agree trade-offs.
- Business Executives: join the opening and the sign-off, and decide any trade-off the teams can't settle.
- Scrum Masters are welcome, and often help facilitate the team breakouts.
Before you start
- Have the capacity plan, every milestone plan and the ranked portfolio list shared two working days ahead.
- Set up a dependency board, physical or online, with one column per sprint and one row per team.
- Book the Business Executives for the first 30 minutes and the last hour.
Agenda
| Time | Session |
|---|---|
| 09:00 | Opening (30 min). Business Executives restate the business priorities. The Program Manager walks through the ranked list and the capacity plan. |
| 09:30 | Plan walk-throughs (2 hours). Each Project Manager presents goals, milestones, capacity fit and top risks. Each takes about 10 minutes, plus questions. |
| 11:30 | Home Team priorities (30 min). Product Owners share their main Discretionary items for the quarter. |
| 13:00 | Team breakouts (2 hours). Teams adjust their plans and post dependencies on the board. Each dependency needs agreement from the team that has to provide it. |
| 15:00 | Risks and trade-offs (1 hour). Go through the open risks, unresolved dependencies and unstaffed projects, and decide what to cut, move or accept. |
| 16:00 | Confidence vote and sign-off (1 hour). Each team votes 1 to 5 on its own plan. Any vote under 3 is discussed and the plan fixed before sign-off. Business Executives then sign off the quarterly plan. |
Steps
- Open with the why. Tie the day to the business priorities and the ranked list, so trade-offs have a reference point.
- Walk through every plan. Keep to time, and park detailed questions for the breakouts.
- Make dependencies visible. Every cross-team need goes on the board with a sprint and both teams' agreement. Mark any dependency without agreement in red.
- Resolve the red items. In the risks and trade-offs session, decide each red dependency and each unstaffed project: fix it, move it, cut it, or accept the risk with an owner.
- Take a confidence vote. Fix any plan with a vote under 3 before sign-off. Don't sign off a plan the team doesn't believe in.
- Sign off. Business Executives approve the quarterly plan as a whole.
- Publish the signed-off plan, the dependency board and the decisions within one working day.
Outputs
- A signed-off quarterly plan: every project's milestones, plus each Home Team's Discretionary priorities.
- A dependency board with an agreed date for every cross-team dependency.
- A risk log with owners.
- Recorded decisions on cuts, moves and unstaffed projects.
Pitfalls
- Status reports instead of planning. The day is for making decisions. If a plan walk-through turns into an update, move it to the breakouts.
- Dependencies agreed by one side. A dependency only counts once the team that must provide it agrees.
- Signing off everything. If the confidence votes are low, cutting scope now costs less than missing milestones later.