DR²IVE™ Defined

The acronym DR²IVE™ stands for Developing Robust Roadmaps Integrating Value Enterprises.  Breaking the acronym down, each term is defined as follows:

• Developing --- Reinforces the fact that “assessment coupled with improvement” must be a “never-ending process.”
• Robust --- Focuses on “reduction of variation and optimization” of strategic plans within and between multiple organizations, with a particular focus on alliances and expanding the Efficient Frontier.
• Roadmaps --- Advocates a “systematic collaboration methodology” using projects as the building blocks that are networked into five-year Robust Roadmaps™ with “measurable results.”
• Integrating --- Promotes the use of the Robust Roadmaps™ as the “basis for strategic collaboration” internally between divisions and business units, as well as externally between alliances, mergers, acquisitions and other partners.
• Value --- Reduces the scope to “core enterprises” that add value from the “customer’s viewpoint” and focuses the organizations engaged on optimizing their Efficient Frontier through planning for the collaborative Robust Horizon™.
• Enterprises --- Defines organizations that have established processes that integrate their businesses and proactively manage their strategic plans through Robust Roadmaps focused on the Robust Horizon™.

 

DR²IVE™ consists of five core processes.  Each process has anywhere from five to seven phases, for a total of twenty-nine distinct phases.  All of the processes have collaborative discussions as the second phase that lead to collaborative results in the subsequent phases. All of the processes may be accomplished online in a virtual environment or face-to-face traditional meetings. The five processes with the phases are as follows:

• DESIGN Process:  Define, Explore, Select, Involve, Gauge, Negotiate
• SCORE Process:  Score, Consensus, Optimize, Review, Engage
• AUDIT Process:  Analyze, Understand, Discover, Initiate, Transfer
• ROADMAP Process:  Review, Opportunity, Agree, Develop, Milestone, Authorize and Proceed
• ROBUST Process:  Review, Opportunity, Broker, Unite, Stabilize, Track

Each of the processes above is discussed in greater detail in the body of this document.  The remaining sub-sections of this overview present the following introduction topics: Goal of DR²IVE™, Robust Horizon™, Robust Roadmaps™, DR²IVE™ Assessment and Roadmap Development.

Goal of DR²IVE™

The primary goal of DR²IVE™ is to collectively expand each organization’s Efficient Frontier to yield greater returns using the same (or less) resources than would have normally been used on a lesser Efficient Frontier.

 

DR²IVE™ does this by enabling professionals to create actionable Robust Roadmaps™ that coordinate and justify collaboration opportunities among departments, divisions, business units, enterprises, alliances, mergers, acquisitions, governments and other collaborative endeavors between multiple organizations.

 

Frontier Expansion

The Efficient Frontier is the optimal portfolio of projects that an organization can select based on its current information and constraining resources.  DR²IVE™ expands the Efficient Frontier in two ways:

 

1. DR²IVE™ increases the return on existing project proposals through organizational sharing and synergies, which reduce the costs of existing project proposals thereby freeing resources to add additional projects.
2. DR²IVE™ increases the quality and number of new and future project proposals by focusing on world-class capabilities, existing and future paradigm shifts, and collaborative opportunities both within the enterprise and outside with alliances.

 

DR²IVE™ expands the Efficient Frontier three times for most organizations.  Assume that a division or business unit within a larger organization has embarked on a DR²IVE™ Initiative.  The following Efficient Frontier expansions are possible:

 

1. World-Class Frontier: The first expansion occurs when a division or business unit assesses itself against world-class and discovers higher return opportunities that it did not have in its “current information” or knowledge base.  DR²IVE™ enables organizations to reach this new frontier through the SCORE Process.
2. Enterprise Frontier: The second expansion occurs when the division or business unit combines its assessment results with the larger organization’s other divisions or business units to discover even more opportunities for improvement and opportunities to reduce costs of some projects through collaboration synergies. DR²IVE™ enables organizations to reach this new frontier through the ROADMAP Process.
3. Robust Frontier: The third expansion occurs when the organization combines its assessment results with its alliance’s results to discover still more opportunities for improvement and opportunities to reduce costs of some projects through collaboration. DR²IVE™ enables organizations to reach this new frontier through the ROBUST Process.

 

The bottom line is that DR²IVE™ results in developing higher return projects for given resources, thereby expanding the Efficient Frontier upward where the organization yields greater return for the exact same level of resources.  The following figure illustrates the Efficient Frontier expansion as discussed above.

 

 

In the figure, an organization has determined that is cannot exceed 20,000 management hours in the next calendar year for improvement projects.  Under the current scenario, the budgeted hours will yield a $3,500,000 return as shown by Portfolio A.  After assessment against world-class, new opportunities are identified and added to the project portfolio mix.  As a result, the Efficient Frontier shifts upward and the budgeted hours will yield $5,300,000, which is a $1,800,000 increase over the previous Efficient Frontier.  The new portfolio is titled Portfolio B in the figure.  Similarly, the Enterprise Frontier yields Portfolio C and an additional $700,000. Finally, the Robust Frontier yields an additional $2,000,000 as shown by Portfolio D.  The total increase from $3,500,000 in Portfolio A to $8,000,000 in Portfolio D is $4,500,000, which is roughly a 130% increase in return without increasing management hours dedicated to the projects.

Robust Horizon™

In the following figure, the curve at the top represents an infeasible Efficient Frontier.  Since there is no such thing as an infeasible Efficient Frontier, we will call the new type of curve a “horizon” that can be seen when you look beyond the Efficient Frontier.  A “horizon” is created by considering all feasible projects plus proposed projects that are relevant, but currently considered temporarily infeasible. The cumulative sum of the feasible and proposed projects results in the horizon curve which is above (or directly on) the Robust Frontier Curve.  Hence, the appropriate name for the horizon curve is the Robust Horizon™.

Robust Horizon™ Management
In managing the proposed projects in the Robust Horizon, a new management approach called Robust Horizon™ Management (RHM) was developed as a part of DR²IVE™. Robust Horizon™ Management refers to the management of proposed projects that are relevant for the future, but cannot be added to the current project portfolio. The terms “relevant” and “proposed” are critical in understanding RHM.  “Relevant” projects are those that managers believe are needed to create or maintain future competitive advantage. “Proposed” means the projects are not currently in the project portfolio.

Perhaps the best way to describe RHM is by contrasting it to Project Portfolio Management (PPM).  With PPM, only funded projects are added to a project portfolio. In addition, PPM is focused on limiting the number of projects in the portfolio.  In contrast, RHM focuses on maximizing the number of relevant projects in both the current project portfolio and future portfolios.  RHM looks ahead to marshal resources so proposed projects can be added at the right time.

DR²IVE™ achieves the revolutionary leaps in improvement discussed in this section through the development of new frontiers and the Robust Horizon™.  Underlying these leaps is Robust Roadmaps™.  Robust Roadmaps™ maximize the opportunities for improvement that an organization has within its reach and extends even further by focusing the organization beyond existing Efficient Frontiers to the Robust Horizon™.  The good news is that Robust Roadmaps are developed through a clear, concise and doable methodology.  That methodology is called DR²IVE™.

Robust Roadmaps™

The definition of Robust Roadmaps™ is as follows:

Robust Roadmaps™ are strategic plans developed collaboratively by two or more alliance organizations that integrate the organizations through projects selected against world-class capabilities.

Results of Robust Roadmaps™ are: tangible project networks (roadmaps), reduced overall uncertainty, greater collaboration, and lower total costs.

Emphasis should be placed on the two conditions in the definition that must be met for roadmaps to be robust.  The two conditions are “developed collaboratively” and “projects selected against world-class.”   If one or both of the conditions are not met, then the roadmaps are not considered to be robust.

DR²IVE™ is the only methodology in the world designed to result in Robust Roadmaps™.   DR²IVE™ fosters unprecedented levels of collaboration between organizations by creating collaborative projects that focus on proactive and world-class improvements, not just projects focused on putting out the “latest fire” or resolving pending problems.  Such collaboration decreases project uncertainty between organizations in terms of cost and time.

In addition, DR²IVE™ advocates using project management, program management and project portfolio management approaches coupled with world-class capabilities assessment to more accurately plan target results of strategies for your organization and its alliances.  DR²IVE™ fosters a higher level of collaboration that results in strategic plans that have higher certainty than if the plans were created independently by each organization.  The plans are represented by organization, enterprise, alliance and horizon roadmaps that together culminate into integrated Robust Roadmaps™.

Robust Project Concept
Genichi Taguchi first popularized the term “robust” in association with quality as “robust quality.” Taguchi advocated identifying target values for design parameters to produce robust quality using statistical experimentation.  Taguchi’s approach focused on consistency in hitting the target values rather than being within a band of tolerance. In a similar way, robust projects are those completed at or near the target budget and/or duration such that the potential loss is minimized.  Taguchi’s Robust Quality concept is presented on the left side of the following figure where a traditional design specification (goalpost) is compared against a target tolerance.  The right side of the figure presents the Robust Roadmaps™ concept of Robust Project.

Reduction in project variation results in more robust projects, programs, project portfolios and ultimately roadmaps.   This is because projects are the building blocks of roadmaps.  So if you want to build roadmaps that are robust, start with reducing the variation in the projects that are the building blocks of roadmaps.

Reducing Project Variance
So how is variance reduced in projects?  If the projects involve machinery, then better machinery might be an answer.  If the projects require a process be followed that is ambiguous, then a reengineered process that is not ambiguous may be an answer.  More often than not variance reduction occurs from better and open communication between the professionals that are required to manage and complete the project.  Professionals that plan the project together are more likely to come up with accurate time estimates of the activities in the project than if they are not included.  Through the dialogue, previously unknown constraints, issues, opportunities and threats will be vetted leading to better estimates.

The quality of communication between two or more organizations is dependent upon the level of trust between people.  If your organization’s projects with other divisions, business units, suppliers and customers are best characterized as reactive or “fire fighting” projects, then there is a good chance communications between your organization and others are tainted by a lack of trust.  Lack of trust and communication usually increases project variation.   In contrast, DR²IVE™ fosters measurable trust by generating proactive projects with outside organizations rather than reactive projects that focus only on problems.

DR²IVE™ Assessment

DR²IVE™ starts with assessment of current capabilities against world-class capabilities.  Why focus on capabilities?  Companies often set goals based on performance benchmarks without providing managers the knowledge on how to improve.  This is a reactive management approach.  A more proactive approach is to measure capabilities. Capabilities are what enable organizations to close their gaps between best practices and current state.  DR²IVE™ focuses on improving capabilities so performance benchmarks are improved.  The following figure illustrates the relationship between capabilities and performance.

 

 

 
World-Class Management Step Charts
Assessment is accomplished by evaluating organizations on a series of DR²IVE™ World-Class Management Charts.  Bullets in the charts are called attributes.  Attributes describe states or capabilities.  Whether an attribute refers to a state or capability, projects are what organizations use to change a state or create a capability.  Although attributes are written in generic terms, the projects needed to actuate the attribute are different for every organization. To simplify the assessment process, a color coding scheme is used to categorize the attributes:

 

Black = Irrelevant (bullet is ignored)
Green = Attributes with the related project(s) completed
Yellow = Attributes with project(s) started but not completed
Red = Attributes with project(s) that should start within 2 years
Blue = Attributes with Project(s) that should start between 2 – 5 years

 

An example of an assessed chart without the detail of the Attribute Scores is given below.

 

The score calculated for the chart is 4.7 out of 10.  Another way to look at it is that the organization has completed 47% of the capabilities desired in the step chart.  Note that the attributes in the chart are not intended to be legible.  The point of the illustration is to present the concept of a step chart to the reader.

 

Measuring Collaboration Success
Individual chart analyses and their associated Chart Scores can be pooled together for an organization to form a single weighted metric called the Organization’s DR²IVE™ Score.  DR²IVE™ Scores can be pooled together with scores of other organizations to calculate Enterprise Scores, Chain Scores, Alliance Scores and other combinations as needed.

 

The result?  The scores provide metrics that can be leveraged to unify your enterprise, chain, alliance or whatever collaboration your organization desires to maximize.  More importantly the scores provide a basis to unify your roadmap with the roadmaps of your closest allies towards long-term strategic improvements and competitive advantage.

 

Paradigm Integration
Since DR²IVE™ incorporates the latest developments in management practice, it can be thought of as a paradigm integrator.  As a paradigm integrator, DR²IVE™ brings together the world’s best practices under one “umbrella” into a single methodology.  Organizations can then tap the best practices from established and new paradigms without becoming too focused on one paradigm.

 

Never-ending Improvement
The focus on world-class capabilities means that each and every year the charts are updated to reflect the world’s best management practices.  The updating feature is in contrast to many maturity models that exist today, such as the Capability Maturity Model (CMM), where the evolution of an organization is complete once the highest step has been achieved. If an organization achieves world-class one year and then does nothing to improve in the next year, then there is a very good chance that the organization will lose its world-class status.  The never-ending improvement feature of the World-Class Management Charts means that organizations leveraging DR²IVE™ will maintain their competitive capability over time.

 

Navigation Wheel
A summary output from a DR²IVE™ Assessment for an organization is the DR²IVE™ Navigation Wheel, which is illustrated below.   The DR²IVE™ Navigation Wheel focuses organizations on meeting customer (and shareholder) needs through strategic improvement projects that close the gaps between current state and world-class.  Essentially, the Navigation Wheel is a summary of the assessment.  The Navigation Wheel highlights the company’s existing capabilities in green and yellow shaded areas and future needs in red and blue shaded areas.  The steering wheel look of the Navigation Wheel is indicative of how managers should be in charge of steering their organization towards world-class.

 

Roadmap Development

Assessment is merely a conduit to the greater goal of mapping.  The real power in DR²IVE™ is what organizations can then do with the assessment knowledge.  The results from the assessment analysis identify opportunities and constraints for capability improvements of both individual organizations and multiple organizations in alliances. 

Below is an example of a roadmap with two of the projects or milestones highlighted.  The roadmap is a strategic plan.  As with any roadmap, each project or milestone links to more detailed information.

    

Once developed, Robust Roadmaps™ can provide competitive advantage unmatched by roadmaps developed independently.  In conclusion, Robust Roadmaps™ are:

• Tangible - they can be seen, discussed, debated, and followed.
• Synergistic – they enable synergistic opportunities between organizations to become reality.  Previously disengaged parts come together as a cohesive whole, leading to optimization of the relationships.
• Stable - Robust Roadmaps™ reduce uncertainty.  Organizations can see into the future through their maps.  Trust builds.  Collaboration flourishes. Capabilities expand.
• Profitable - Robust Roadmaps™ ultimately result in decreasing costs while simultaneously increasing capability.  The bottom line result? Profitability improves.