The Outcome-Value Statement

This article describes a concise and effective method to communicate a project, a requirement or even an organization's purpose to multiple audiences, each listening for their part of the message.  It does this by linking the work being done to the value being delivered through its expected outcome or outcomes.    

The work being done can be the list of various projects or the major components of projects.  It can a list of requirements for a new service or a new set of rules being considered.  This is the place to begin creating the Outcome-Value statement.  Simply write them down in a list with the most significant items first.  While the list could be very lengthy, it's best to summarize enough to keep its size to ten or less.  

The next step is to write down the Values you expect to gain. These fall into three categories: cost, service and risk.   It's not time yet to link the value to the work being done.  Just list the values for the entire effort.  It's okay to make these somewhat fuzzy for the purpose of this effort.  It's not intended to replace a business case analysis.  So a statement of "reduce maintenance costs" or "improve service reliability" is sufficient. 

The third step is usually the most difficult, although it comes faster as you become familiar with the process.  This involves stating or predicting one or more of the resulting Outcomes.  An Outcome is simply how are things different.  How does a business process change?  How might the people using a new service view the difference?  Perhaps a current service is being eliminated as part of this project.  The Outcomes will typically show you where your change management issues exist or where communication to affected parties will be required.  Most importantly an Outcome is not a cost, service or risk statement.  Saving a million dollars is a Value, not an Outcome.  "Reducing product recalls" is an Outcome, not a Value.  Outcomes may not be all that exciting, for example, changing a supplier that results in a million dollar savings.  It's an exciting Value, but not an exciting Outcome from your point of view.

The final step is to assign each Value to one or more Outcomes and link each work item to one or more Outcomes.  The result should clearly show what is being done, how your world will change and why it's a good thing.

Let's use implementing an email retention policy as an example.  Prior to this project people could freely keep or delete anything in their email mailbox, but new regulations and service disruptions are requiring a change.  Let's start by writing down a fictitious, but realistic, set of proposed rules. 


     - Emails older than 90 days will be automatically deleted  
     - Each user's mailbox is capped at 250 megabytes of storage
     - Email backups tapes will be erased after 30 days
     - Users can only move emails requiring longer-term storage to the content management service
     - Automatic deletions and erasures will be halted as required by legal proceedings

Step two is listing the Values expected.  

     - Reduce disk and tape storage costs (cost)  
     - Improved email system performance (service)  
     - Fewer "smoking gun" emails being kept (risk) 
     - Compliance with court orders (service) 
     - Retaining business records and knowledge (service)

Now the hardest part, the Outcomes.  Even in this made-up example it took about ten minutes to clearly state what is different.  Looking at it from the email user's viewpoint helps see the Outcomes.

     1. Email Becomes a Transitory Tool 
     2. New Processes for Retaining Emails for Legal and Business Requirements

Putting this all together and linking the new set of rules to the Outcomes, the final Outcome-Value statement is produced.  Each Value is listed as a bulleted item after its associated Outcome and after each new rule the Outcome it supports is listed in parenthesis.  

Email Retention Outcome-Value Statement

1. Email Becomes a Transitory Tool

     > Reduce disk and tape storage costs  
     > Improved email system performance 
     > Fewer "smoking gun" emails being kept

2. New Processes for Retaining Emails for Legal and Business Requirements

     > Compliance with court orders  
     > Retaining business records and knowledge

     - Emails older than 90 days will be automatically deleted (1)
     - Each user's mailbox is capped at 250 megabytes of storage (1)
     - Email backups tapes will be erased after 30 days (1)
     - Users can only move emails requiring longer-term storage to the content management service (2)
     - Automatic deletions and erasures will be halted as required by legal proceedings (2)