Governance (in the software development domain) is based on specifying the decision rights and accountabilities needed to elicit desired behaviours in the development and sustainment of products and service.
Business Governance
Is the set of decisions that define expectations, grants power, and verifies performance
Information Technology Governance
Firms with superior software development governance have 25% higher profits than firms with poor governance, given the same strategic objectives.
These top performers have custom designed product development governance for their strategies.
Just as corporate governance aims to ensure quality decisions about all corporate assets, software development governance links decisions with company objectives and monitors performance and accountability.
Program Governance
Program Governance is the framework that ensures project’s are conceived and executed in accordance with best project management practices within a wider framework of an organizational governance processes.
Effective program governance ensures projects deliver their expected value.
An appropriate governance framework ensures all expenditures are appropriate for the risks being managed.
Program governance approach is not about micromanagement, it is about setting terms of reference an operating framework, defining boundaries, and ensure planning and execution are carried out in a way which assures all projects deliver the planned benefits.
The Framework for Program Governance
- Connect project performance measures with business performance measures through policies, practices, procedures, processes, and tools.
- Measure and manage the spend for the value produced from project work, including software development, infrastructure, customer support, testing, quality assurance, validation and other support functions.
- Assure accountability of organizations and individuals in their participation in product development and sustainment processes through performance reporting and variance analysis against planned performance of cost, schedule, and technical outcomes.
- Increase the maturity of product development, release, and sustainment processes to transform the organization to increase the effectiveness of all work activities.
Putting Program Governance to Work
- Align the processes of software development, testing, quality assurance, release management, and operations with the business needs.
- Provide predictable, consistent processes that meet customer expectations.
- Enable efficient and effective delivery of products and services.
- Enable measurable, improvable processes that can be tuned for accurate delivery and overall effectiveness of product or service offerings.
