Businesses exist to create benefits for their stakeholders, and the corporate vision or mission statement defines
the scope and extent of those benefits, as shown in the left-hand side of Exhibit 1. However vision alone does
not create business benefits, and many organisations use projects as the change vehicle to deliver the capability
which leads to the required benefits, perhaps managing related projects through higher-level programmes (see
right-hand side of Exhibit 1). Defining the vision and business benefits is the realm of strategy, whereas
projects, programmes and their deliverables describe the tactics by which the strategy is achieved. Project (and
programme) objectives sit between the strategic and tactical levels, since they are defined in relation to the
strategic vision, and they in turn define the requirement for projects (top arrow in Exhibit 1). Objectives are also
used to measure the value of project deliverables (bottom arrow in Exhibit 1). Many projects fail because of a
disconnect between strategic vision and tactical project deliverables, often as a result of poorly defined
project/programme objectives. This space between the two levels of strategy and tactics requires careful and
proactive management if projects are to succeed in delivering the required benefits to the business. Yet it is
precisely in this area occupied by project/programme objectives that businesses are most at risk.