From idea to program
- Explore: gather signals and understand the unmet capability.
- Incubate: challenge assumptions with users and specialists.
- Authorize: approve the owner, baseline, scope, resources and tests.
- Execute: work in phases with evidence reviews.
- Transition or close: transfer a usable capability, or preserve what was learned.
The program record
Keep one versioned record of the capability, accountable owner, team, milestones, evidence, decisions, budget assumptions, risks and intended acceptor. An unresolved critical dependency should be visible, not hidden by progress reporting.