Prioritizing Prioritization

About this webinar

Prioritization is often reduced to a score, a ranked list or a meeting where people decide what comes first. Harry Max, Wes Bright and Stuart Easton take a broader view: prioritization is a repeatable process for turning strategy into choices about where people, time and resources go.

A ranking can help structure the conversation, but it does not make the decision. Leaders still have to choose what to support, what to delay and what will not happen when resources are limited.

What you’ll hear

• Start with strategy. Strategic goals provide the filter for lower-level decisions. Disagreement about projects can reveal a deeper disagreement about what matters most.
• Prioritize before locking OKRs. Stuart argues that prioritization belongs inside strategic planning. If objectives and bonuses are fixed first, leaders can end up defending the projects needed to hit their own targets instead of considering the portfolio as a whole.
• Treat prioritization as a process, not a meeting. Harry introduces the DEGAP model: Decide, Engage, Gather, Arrange and Prioritize. The work starts before anything is ranked, and the decision may need to be revisited when circumstances change.
• Use the method that fits the decision. Harry describes a SaaS company using RICE largely because its product lead had used it before. Stuart notes that RICE can work well with one decision-maker, while decisions involving many stakeholders need a way to make competing priorities explicit. Harry’s broader point is that RICE, impact-versus-effort, simulations and hybrid methods such as AHP each fit different situations.
• Compare like with like. Small tasks and major investments do not necessarily belong in the same decision process. The amount of analysis should match the scale and consequences of the choice.
• Make the reasoning visible. Wes argues that a score gives leadership useful evidence, not a verdict. Leaders still apply judgment, and clear reasoning matters even when someone’s preferred project is not chosen.
• Make room for new opportunities deliberately. When something new arrives, ask not only where it ranks but what existing work will wait, change or give way if it is supported.

The session is useful for strategy, product, transformation, portfolio and PMO leaders who need prioritization to work across organizational levels rather than remain a backlog-scoring exercise.