How to Use a Decision Matrix for Website Project Selection
In this example, we will make decision matrix and then use it to evaluate the “press release redesign” and “support site requires maintenance contract” from the “Rationalize Your Project Selection Process” article.
1. Make an impact driver chart – First, we need to make a list of different project impact drivers we want to measure. Revenue gain, costs savings and strategic value are things that clearly drive any project’s impact. And there are tons of other benefits we could add. But to keep it simple just add website usability improvements and availability of funding for the project.
2. Assign ranges for each impact driver – To make scoring consistent and remove as much debate from how each impact driver should be scored as possible, give each impact driver a series of ranges for their possible values. Then we assign each range a score of 0, 1, 3 or 5.
3. Weight each impact driver - Each impact driver offers a different amount of benefit to a project - revenue increases of real money is a lot bigger indication of project impact than funding availability for instance - so we want to weigh each impact driver differently. Think of each impact driver weight as a percentage of the whole project impact; We want the total weight to equal 100%.
4. Make the decision matrix – Now that we have set up our impact driver chart, we need to make the decision matrix itself.
5. Score your projects – This is the fun part. “Press Releases Redesign” project has funding and improves usability but doesn’t add revenue, reduce costs or even have strategic value. But the “Support Site Requires Maintenance Contract ” project increases revenue, has some strategic value but is a little short on funding.
Our scores, as computed using the impact driver chart, go in the score column. The weighted score is the score times the weight from the impact driver chart. Then we total up the weighted scores to get the projects total impact score.
6. Bask in the brilliance of it – Now it’s clear that the “press release redesign” project doesn’t pack the impact of the “Support Site Requires Maintenance Contract” project. And our decision matrix will work for every project that comes our way. Nice.
But before you rush off and slam this process into your organization, it’s important to note that getting good organizational results can be tricky. Here are a few tips on organizational roll out for your website project roadmap.