- Idea requests money
- Discovery begins after approval
- Missing stakeholders and requirements surface
- Scope, cost, and dates move
- Teams enter rescue mode
Original method by Brooke Arent · investment-readiness governance
Executives should fund decisions, not discovery.
Brooke’s governance method moves requirements, stakeholder alignment, feasibility, downstream-impact analysis, economics, and success measures in front of the funding decision. SteerCo receives a decision-ready investment instead of paying the project team to discover preventable problems after approval.
Design principle
Projects earn the right to compete for enterprise investment.
Why Brooke’s method is different
Move preventable uncertainty in front of the funding decision.
Traditional intake often sends an idea to executives before the organization has completed the work needed to price, sequence, or safely deliver it. Brooke reverses that order.
- Need and requirements are evidenced
- Impacts and dependencies are mapped
- Business, IT, and controls sign
- Economics and measures are baselined
- Only then does SteerCo vote
Requirements risk is not theoretical.
PMI reported inaccurate requirements gathering as a primary cause in 35% of failed projects.
PMI source ↗Define success before delivery.
PMI’s Net Project Success Score was 41 when success criteria were defined upfront, versus 20 when they were not.
PMI source ↗Underinvesting in requirements is expensive.
A NASA cost-analysis benchmark cited by PMI found projects spending under 5% on requirements experienced 80%–200% cost overruns.
PMI source ↗Benchmarks describe external research and are not presented as measured Axiom & Arc client uplift. They explain the risks Brooke’s readiness method is designed to reduce.
After approval · earned value management
See the variance before the crisis.
Funding is not the end of governance. Brooke uses EVM where appropriate to compare planned work, completed work, and actual cost. This turns delivery data into an early request for help rather than a late explanation.
PVPlanned Value
What should be complete by now?
EVEarned Value
What budgeted value is actually complete?
ACActual Cost
What did the completed work actually cost?
Schedule performanceSPI = EV ÷ PVBelow 1.0 signals less work completed than planned.
Cost performanceCPI = EV ÷ ACBelow 1.0 signals the work is costing more than planned.
Management responseTrend → forecast → intervene
Leaders can adjust scope, capacity, sequencing, or support before the team misses the date and burns out trying to recover it.
The U.S. Department of Energy describes EVM as an early-warning mechanism that helps managers identify performance problems and take corrective action. DOE source ↗
Prove the business need
The PM documents the problem, current-state evidence, affected outcomes, urgency, and cost of inaction, then tests whether a project is actually the right response.
Complete requirements and impact analysis
Business requirements are developed with SMEs before funding. Every materially impacted team identifies process, data, resource, integration, customer, and operating-model consequences while changes are still inexpensive.
Secure cross-functional feasibility
Impacted functions sign the requirements. IT validates architecture, integration, security, data, and delivery feasibility; Regulatory, SOX, Quality, Legal, Finance, or other control owners approve where relevant.
Make the economics and measures visible
The business case identifies cost, benefit, risk, dependencies, capacity demand, time-to-value, accountable owners, baselines, targets, and the evidence that will prove whether value was realized.
Take only decision-ready work to SteerCo
Executives compare vetted initiatives against strategy and actual capacity, then fund, sequence, hold, rescope, or stop. The vote is an informed portfolio choice, not permission to begin basic discovery.
Govern after approval
The approved baseline feeds delivery and value reporting. EVM, benefits measures, decision logs, and capacity signals expose adverse trends early enough to assist the project before a missed date becomes a rescue operation.
Need this operating logic inside a real portfolio?
Discuss the application ↗