Getting Started with Project Request Scorecards

This introduction article will help administrators to create and configure a project request scorecard in the Portfolio Planning section of TDAdmin. The user must have access to Portfolio Planning in TDAdmin.

Overview

It is common for organizations to score project requests to assess their relative value. Project requests can be quite varied in nature, making comparisons difficult. Scoring aims to provide a common set of criteria that are relevant to all requests so that they can be assessed more accurately.

Project request scorecards allow you define a set of criteria that are used to generate a calculated score for the project request. The criteria are presented as a series of questions, in which users are asked to rate the relative value of each criterion for the project request begin assessed. The total score for the scorecard is the sum of the scores of the criteria. You can define multiple scorecards and use them on different types of project requests. A default scorecard will be automatically created with all your scorecard criteria.

Where to Find This

Scorecards appear in both the TDAdmin and TDNext interfaces, in the Portfolio Planning and Projects apps. They can also appear in TDClient if they are included in the project request form.

  • TDAdmin > Portfolio Planning is where administrators create and configure scorecards.
  • TDNext > Portfolio Planning is where users assigned to evaluate project requests score those requests using scorecards. Note: Scorecards can also be used in projects if this option is enabled.

Navigate to create/edit project request scorecards and scorecard criteria as follows:

  • TDAdmin > Portfolio Planning > Scorecards or Scorecard Criteria

Where to Start

For technical details on how the scorecard works, review the How Project Requests are Scored article.

Creating a New Scorecard

To create a new scorecard:

  1. In TDAdmin, navigate to Portfolio Planning > Scorecards.
  2. Click the +New button to create a new scorecard.
  3. Enter a name for the scorecard, and optionally a description.
  4. Check the Active and/or Is Default options to enable them (typically this will not occur until the scorecard criteria have been added).
  5. Click the Save button.

Adding Scorecard Criteria to a Scorecard

Note: Criteria will need to be defined before they can be added to a scorecard (see Defining Scorecard Criteria below). Repeat the process below to add all required criteria to a scorecard.

To add scorecard criteria to a scorecard:

  1. In TDAdmin, navigate to Portfolio Planning > Scorecards.
  2. Locate the scorecard to which criteria are to be added and click the Edit link in the relevant row.
  3. In the Criteria section of the window that appears, click the +Add button.
  4. Select a Criterion from the dropdown list and specify an Order value (this will determine the order in which the criteria are listed on the scorecard; criteria with the same numeric value will be listed alphabetically).
  5. Click the Save button.

Defining Scorecard Criteria

To define the scorecard criteria: 

  1. In TDAdmin, navigate to Portfolio Planning > Scorecard Criteria.
  2. Click the +New button to define a new scorecard criterion.
  3. In the New Criterion display window, provide a Name for the criterion (usually in the form of a question) and optionally assign a Percent of Value. This is a weighting for the criterion relative to other criteria, and the higher the values chosen, the higher the value of the overall score. Provide Comments as required.
  4. Click the Save button.
  5. Click the +Add in the Choices section to define a choice. Choices can be regarded as the options for answering the question posed in the criterion name. For example, if the criterion is “To what extent does this request support the organization’s strategic goals?”, the choices might be “Fully”, “Partially” and “Not at All”. Each choice requires a Name and a Value, which is a means of weighting the choices such that selecting “Fully” in the example would result in a higher score for that criterion, which in turn could result in a higher overall score. 
  6. If a scorecard has already been defined, you can click the +Add button in the Scorecards section to add this criterion to a scorecard.

Total Weighted Score Calculations

Each scorecard criterion is given a weight relative to the other criteria using the Percent of Value field. Each choice within a scorecard criterion is given a weight relative to the other choices within that criterion using the Value field.

The score for one criterion is given by this formula: 

CriterionScore = (SelectedChoiceValue / MaximumChoiceValue) * PercentOfValue

The final score for the score card is generated using this formula: 

ScoreCardScore = SUM(CriterionScore)

Deleting Scorecard Criteria

To delete unused project scorecard criteria:

  1. In TDAdmin, navigate to Portfolio Planning > Scorecard Criteria.
  2. Click the Delete link next to the criterion to be deleted.
  3. Click the OK button in the confirmation popup.

Assigning Scorecards to Project Requests

To ensure that project requests have the right scorecards, they can be assigned automatically. If no automatic assignment is set up, all project requests will use the default scorecard. Scorecards can be assigned in a workflow step. The assignment step should happen before the step where an evaluator would be filling out the scorecard.

To add a scorecard to a workflow step: 

  1. In TDAdmin, navigate to Portfolio Planning > Workflows
  2. Click the name of the relevant workflow. 
  3. In the Steps tab, click Edit on the step to which you want to assign the scorecard.
  4. Choose the Scorecard you want to assign from the dropdown and click Save

Changing Scorecards on a Project Request

Once multiple scorecards are defined, users may want to change a scorecard on an individual project request. This requires the Change Scorecards permission in the user’s security role.

To change the scorecard on a project request:

  1. In TDNext > Portfolio Planning, navigate to the appropriate project request, and click on the name of the request.
  2. In the request window, click on Scorecard and then the Change button to select another scorecard from the dropdown.
  3. Click the Save button. There will be a prompt to confirm the change. Criteria that are shared between the two scorecards will be preserved, but all other criteria from the old scorecard will be discarded. 

Examples

Review an example scorecard configuration and questions in the Example Project Request Scorecard article.

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