Why Thorough Project Intake Enables PPM Success
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Many PMOs struggle not because of poor execution, but because projects enter the organization without sufficient clarity, alignment, or governance. Too often, organizations face a flood of “urgent” projects competing for limited resources, with little visibility into true demand versus capacity. Projects are kicked off without clear ownership, funding, or success criteria, forcing leaders to make prioritization decisions without consistent, reliable data. The result is predictable: teams burn out under constant pressure while the initiatives that matter most to the business stall or fail to deliver their intended value.  

When there is no consistent pipeline for approving and initiating work, teams are left reacting to demand rather than delivering on strategy. Healthy project governance starts with a standardized, transparent way to evaluate, prioritize, and authorize work based on strategic value and capacity.

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GPMO’s Intake Governance Philosophy
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We believe project intake governance should enable strategy, speed, and scalability—not create friction. Creating highly configurable Project Portfolio Management (PPM) solutions on a platform like Airtable helps bring structure and visibility to the front end of the portfolio, we design intake models that are right-sized for an organization’s maturity, flexible enough to evolve as needs change, and built around the realities of how decisions are actually made.  
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Governance must be:
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- Right-sized for the organization’s maturity

- Flexible enough to evolve

- Designed with real decision-makers in mind

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Intake isn’t just a process or a form to complete—it’s an ongoing portfolio conversation, supported by clear data and shared context, that helps leaders make confident, timely decisions.

Tips for Effective Intake Governance  

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Establish Strategic Alignment & Prioritization Criteria
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Strong intake governance starts with clarity on what should enter the portfolio, and why. Before workflows or tools are designed, organizations need shared alignment on value and priorities.
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Key tips:

• Define how proposed projects tie directly to strategic objectives, regulatory needs, or operational outcomes.

• Standardize the intake data required to evaluate requests (business value, risk, effort, urgency, and dependencies).

• Create clear demand categories—such as strategic, regulatory, operational, or innovation—to enable meaningful comparisons.

• Agree at the leadership level on what “value” truly means to avoid subjective or inconsistent prioritization.

• Use scoring and prioritization models to balance strategic demand against real delivery capacity, making trade-offs visible and intentional.

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Design a Scalable Intake Workflow That Drives Decisions
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Once alignment criteria are clear, the intake process should move ideas efficiently from request to decision without slowing teams down.
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Key tips:

• Define how requests flow from submission to review, approval, backlog, or rejection with minimal friction.

• Clarify roles and responsibilities for requestors, reviewers, and approvers to eliminate ambiguity.

• Apply governance tiers so lightweight initiatives move quickly while enterprise efforts receive appropriate rigor.

• Build decision checkpoints that maintain momentum without creating bottlenecks or unnecessary meetings.

• Enable the process with the right technology—using platforms like Airtable to centralize requests, automate routing and approvals, and provide real-time visibility into pipeline demand.

When done well, intake becomes a seamless bridge from strategy to execution—ensuring projects enter delivery funded, owned, and aligned, with fewer false starts and stronger outcomes.

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Strong Portfolios Start Before Projects Begin
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Project intake governance isn’t an administrative exercise—it’s a strategic capability that sets the tone for everything that follows. Organizations that get intake right execute with greater focus, confidence, and impact because their portfolios are built on clarity, alignment, and informed decision-making. When you work with our team, intake governance becomes the foundation for tailored, scalable portfolio success—ensuring the right work enters the system at the right time, for the right reasons.

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