CIS-SPM: ServiceNow Certified Implementation Specialist - Strategic Portfolio Management

What is a strategic portfolio?

Everything that an organization does may be a part of the strategic portfolio. This includes change initiatives aimed at improving how the business interacts with customers, promotes products or services, improves employee productivity, and more.

Together, these components of the strategic portfolio help inform important business decisions about which actions should be pursued to positively impact the company and help it reach its goals.

What is the difference between strategic portfolio management vs. adaptive project management?

Although the two terms may seem nearly identical and are sometimes used interchangeably, strategic portfolio management is not the same thing as adaptive project management. While SPM includes the processes and tools for compiling and maintaining the right investments, APM picks up where SPM leaves off, defining how organizations proceed with executing those investments within the portfolio. Both SPM and APM are necessary for organizations who wish to optimize their ability to compete.

CIS-SPM: ServiceNow Certified Implementation Specialist - Strategic Portfolio Management

What are the benefits of strategic portfolio management?

Strategic portfolio management differs from traditional program and project management solutions, in that it is not primarily focused on how the projects, programs, products or initiatives themselves are managed. Instead, the main concern within strategic portfolio management is aligning business strategy with work. This enables decision-makers to plan, deliver, and track value across different methodologies and structures. In other words, it’s designed to ensure that the right activities are being completed to further business goals to align the organization.

With this in mind, businesses may enjoy several valuable advantages from effective strategic portfolio management. These benefits include the following:

Faster time to market

One of the key advantages of strategic portfolio management is its ability to accelerate the time it takes for products, services, or projects to reach the market. By actively managing and prioritizing projects within the portfolio, organizations can optimize resource allocation, streamline processes, and eliminate possible bottlenecks. This results in increased efficiency as projects are aligned with strategic objectives, ensuring that efforts are focused on delivering the most valuable initiatives promptly. With a clear understanding of project dependencies and resource availability, decision-makers can help expedite project delivery, allowing the business to seize market opportunities swiftly and gain a competitive edge.

Improved response time to disruptions

Today's organizations must be prepared to face unexpected disruptions, such as technological advancements, market shifts, or unforeseen events. Strategic portfolio management equips businesses with the agility and flexibility needed to respond effectively to emergent events. By continuously assessing the portfolio and regularly reviewing project priorities, organizations can proactively reallocate resources, adjust project scopes, or even introduce new initiatives to mitigate the impact of disruptions. The ability to respond promptly to disruptions minimizes potential negative consequences and positions the organization for continued growth and resilience.

Better alignment between strategy and execution

Achieving effective integration between strategic objectives and project execution is a common challenge for many organizations. Strategic portfolio management addresses this issue by providing a structured and systematic approach to ensure that projects are aligned with the overall business strategy. SPM facilitates the translation of strategic goals into tangible projects, defining clear objectives, milestones, and success metrics. By actively monitoring project performance and evaluating their alignment with strategic objectives, organizations can make informed decisions regarding project continuation, reprioritization, or termination. This alignment fosters a more cohesive and focused approach to project execution, reducing the risk of pursuing initiatives that do not contribute to the organization's strategic goals.

Improved efficiency

The tools that support strategic portfolio management help simplify project-vetting processes. Companies can easily identify profitable investments while avoiding wasting resources on those initiatives that are less likely to succeed or those not aligned to the organization goals. This helps improve business efficiency by not only identifying and eliminating bad investments, but also by streamlining how organizations approach these investments in the first place. This enables the organization to focus on the right work to achieve the right results.

Cohesion of multiple disciplines

Prioritizing investments based on their potential for alignment with strategic goals is not a new concept—program portfolio management, agile financial management, strategy management, integrated IT portfolio analysis, and other disciplines all have a hand in achieving strategic results. Where SPM differs from more-traditional approaches is in its ability to bring these disciplines together. Instead of each task being performed by a different team, strategic portfolio management cohesively connects related disciplines together in such a way that any change is instantly visible, and immediately accounted for through every related activity.

Increased agility

The modern business world is one of unpredictable and continuous change as new technologies and regulations place even greater pressure on organizations to deliver—and fast. The need for organizational flexibility, competitiveness, innovation, and speed become driving factors that thwart disruption. To keep up with changes as they occur, companies need the agility to pivot their strategies at a moment’s notice. Strategic portfolio management empowers organizations to quickly define strategy, set objectives and key results (OKRs), align roadmaps, create budgets, and secure resources to account for new strategies as change occurs.

Improved speed overall

A major advantage of strategic portfolio management is its ability to accelerate business processes. This goes beyond simply pushing projects more quickly to market; SPM reduces the time needed to push ideas through the innovation funnel, making it possible to complete and launch new digital initiatives within even the strictest deadlines.

Big-picture focus

Finally, and most importantly, strategic portfolio management gives teams a complete picture of their available resources, maintaining focus on long-term strategy and vital objectives even when faced with emergent situations. SPM helps ensure that businesses can operate distraction free, aligning every process and team in such a way that it supports the overall goals of the company.

Ability to realize expected business value from digital initiatives

Organizations invest heavily in digital initiatives to enhance customer experiences, drive innovation, and improve operational efficiency. However, many businesses struggle to fully realize the anticipated value from these investments. Strategic portfolio management provides a framework for evaluating and prioritizing digital initiatives based on their alignment with the business strategy, potential value generation, and resource requirements. By focusing on initiatives that offer the highest returns and effectively managing their execution, organizations can maximize the value they derive from their digital investments, achieving the desired business outcomes.

ServiceNow CIS-SPM Exam Summary:

Exam Name	ServiceNow Certified Implementation Specialist - Strategic Portfolio Management
Exam Code	CIS-SPM
Exam Fee	USD $450
Exam Duration	130 Minutes
Number of Questions	60
Passing Score	Pass / Fail
Format	Multiple Choice Questions
Books / Trainings	Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) Fundamentals  Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) Implementation Performance Analytics (PA) Essentials Performance Analytics (PA) Simulator - Micro-Certification
Sample Questions	ServiceNow CIS - Strategic Portfolio Mgmt Exam Sample Questions and Answers
Practice Exam	ServiceNow Certified Implementation Specialist - Strategic Portfolio Management (CIS-SPM) Practice Test

ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Mgmt Implementation Specialist Syllabus Topics:

Topic	Details	Weights
SPM Implementation Overview	- Overview of SPM - SPM Personas - Now Create Methodology	2%
SPM Applications Overview	- Plugins - Store Applications - Tables & Data Models - Properties & Preferences - User & Role Administration - Group Administration	20%
Idea & Demand Configuration	- Configuring Idea - Idea to Task Process Flow - Integrating Innovation Management with Universal Request - Idea to Demand - Defining Stakeholders - Assessments - Demand Visualization Capabilities	21%
Resource Management Configuration	- Resource Allocation Workbench - State, Schedules, Calendars & Reports	17%
Project Management Configuration	- Project Templates - Project Workspace - Planning Console - Investment Portal - Status Reports - RIDAC	21%
Timecard Management Configuration	- Generate a Timecard - Categories & Policies - Rate Types	5%
SPM Financials Configuration	- Cost Types & Fiscal Calendar - Financial Baseline & Planning Grid - Rate Model - Multi-Currency	8%
Portfolio Planning Workspace Configuration	- Portfolio Planning Overview - Configuring the Portfolio Planning Workspace - Integrate Portfolio Planning with PPM - Capacity Planning	3%
Performance Analytics, Reporting & Dashboards	- Performance Analytics - Reporting - Dashboards	2%
Release Management and Digital Portfolio Management for SPM	- Release Management for SPM Overview - Digital Portfolio Management for SPM Overview	2%