Business Case Assurance Resources

Business Case Sign off process

The information in this guide is intended for general purposes only. For more specific guidance around your organisation’s projects, please get in touch with our team.

In this section, you will find:

Securing any significant investment within an organisation typically requires a compelling business case to ensure the investment has been considered from all angles. The New Zealand public sector typically follows Treasury’s Better Business Case framework to help guide the creation and completion of this, while the private sector will also opt for similar levels of scrutiny on their proposed investments – even if the way in which this is carried out is slightly different than the BBC model.

Through our guides, you’ll learn about business cases and what they mean. In this specific guide, we talk about the process of approval itself – how and why are certain sign off stages usually included? What can business case owners do to help secure approval? We answer these and other questions below.

Managing risks in a project portfolio IQANZ

Getting buy-in from stakeholders before submitting the business case

The strength of a business case can be enhanced when the proposed investment has support from relevant stakeholders within the business and their business units. While it will take some time to identify and engage the right stakeholders as the business case is developed, this is well worth the extra effort.

Typically a business case that will impact upon certain business units will reach the leader(s) within that group before it can be approved. If the first time they’re properly involved is when the business case has already been submitted, there’s a high likelihood that questions and changes will come up. If there’s a lot of resistance from stakeholders in this stage, other decision-makers may think that the business case is simply not thoroughly considered and, therefore, won’t approve it.

Stakeholders should be involved before the business case is even written; their insight into specific parts of the business and needs for change can be a big help to illustrate the benefits of the investment. Use the resources at your disposal across business units in the initial research, and engage them to review the business case as it’s constructed. Come sign-off time, those stakeholders will simply be confirming what they’ve already contributed to in the business case.

Investment Committee – scrutinising investment requests before they become a business case

An investment committee is a group of people within the business who review investment requests from anywhere in the business and provide guidance on whether that investment warrants a formal business case process. This can be a smart move by large complex organisations that may have a lot of investment ideas and requests over the year. Given the time a business case takes to put together well, an investment committee can prevent extended periods of time being expended on business cases that are unlikely to meet strategic goals or be approved by an executive team.

An investment committee should include senior leadership and others who are close to the financial and strategic parts of the business. The group should meet at a frequency that allows a reasonably short period of time between investment request and approval or not – in case there is a time sensitivity around a given business case. The group should have all the personnel and knowledge to make informed decisions about which business cases to green light or not. Often some form of prioritisation and decision-making criteria factor into this process.

The committee should also have a good understanding of what a business case will involve, so they can assess an investment idea early on in terms of its financial, commercial, management, strategic and economic viability. This group doesn’t need to research each of these elements as part of their assessment but should have a good enough understanding to make a sound judgement. Many organisations use a form of Project Brief to lay out this thinking.

Project sponsors or SRO reviews and endorses the business case before it’s submitted to the Executive team

A project sponsor or senior responsible owner is an important role for any project or programme to have, but they should assume this role before the business activity is even approved. In the research and business case development stages, an SRO is the leading advocate and driving force behind the activity. They should be able to articulate the benefits of the investment and ultimately act as the endorsee of the business case before it gets to executive sign off.

The SRO needs to be across each aspect of the business case and will likely field a lot of questions from stakeholders or the executive team before the investment is approved. They’ll need to be able to coordinate a number of people and tasks to construct a cohesive argument for the proposed activity. It’s important to note that the Senior Responsible Owner will want to apply a close level of scrutiny to each element of the business case because their involvement post-approval will be that of successful delivery. The SRO has a direct interest in making sure the business case is solid given their long term relationship with the resulting project.

Programme Management Office – ensuring the business case’s facts and figures are sound

A programme management office or corporate business unit will often be involved in reviewing a business case’s facts and figures against their own systems and reporting to ensure the investment accurately reflects the position and readiness of the organisation. This will include financial information such as available capital or operational budget. It will also involve reviewing the proposal against legal and risk reporting to make sure there are no blindspots or inaccuracies. Whilst a good business case framework should involve all corporate elements, it’s important to have these checks and balances owned by a central programme management office who will have consistent approaches to reviewing each proposed investment.

Executive team reviews business case against the organisation’s strategic objectives

By the time a business case reaches an executive or senior leadership team, it should be in excellent shape in terms of the facts, figures, reasons for the investment and approach to delivering it. The nature of roles within the executive level means that time is at a premium; investments may not make it past this point if they’ve left loose ends or questions that would require any significant research to answer. Senior leaders are not going to have the time nor inclination to help an incomplete business case plug these gaps.

With that said, if the investment does closely align with strategic objectives, it doesn’t necessarily mean the business case is completely off the table. It may simply be referred back into the project steering committee and SRO to address any issues before being reviewed again. This isn’t something to rely upon, though, so having the business case as close to perfect as possible before it hits the executive team is always a good idea.

Has the business case reinforced the need for investment?

There are some questions that will be asked by various groups in the sign-off process of a business case. All of these questions should be asked by project sponsors and the SRO before the signoff process really gets underway.

The core of any good business case is in its ability to reinforce the value and fit of the investment itself. Is it a compelling argument for change? Too often, business cases are built with plenty of ‘how we’ll deliver’, but a lack of ‘why we should deliver’. It’s easy to default to the practicalities of project or programme delivery, but an executive team who will be in a more strategic mindset will expect to know what the ‘return’ will be for the business should that investment be made. Remember, senior leadership teams, are on the line for the prudent and careful use of finances to deliver to their KPIs – so investments will attract a lot of scrutiny. If your business case speaks to the strategic imperatives the executive team is regularly discussing and being measured against, it will likely resonate better.

Public Sector Programme Management IQANZ

Identifying the essential elements for success of the proposed activity

The success of a project is rarely down to one key factor. Really successful projects are a combination of many parts all working together. A large complex organisation depends on the cohesion between financial, legal, technology, risk and many other business units to be successful. There may be particular activities required to deliver the investment. Make sure your business case directly talks to these; dependencies need to be captured before the project is set in motion as they may impact timeframes or resourcing decisions.

The financials need to be well understood for sign off

The costs of the project but also the ongoing financial implications of a change in the business, warrants fine attention to detail. Costs within the technology, people, 3rd party vendors, marketing, legal and any other number of areas will dictate what the investment by the business needs to be. If the project is going to fundamentally change the way the business operates, these costs should be researched and modelled out in the business case too.

Always check financial details with those close to the business’ finances as early as possible. The SRO and sponsors will need to engage the financial controller and other roles to get the information required to build a complete picture of the true cost of the investment.

Is there a practical procurement strategy in place?

Have you considered how the business will engage suppliers to deliver the investment? Organisations with an existing procurement process and the team will have an advantage here as the team working on the business case can interface with procurement staff to build out a feasible plan. This can expedite the procurement aspect of the business case considerably vs. researching and building a procurement process from scratch.

Either way, the business case should demonstrate the types of suppliers that will be engaged in a tender process, the questions that will be asked, the decision-making framework for suitability and the amount of the investment that will need to be allocated to the procurement of suppliers.

Working out the governance structure as part of the business case

If you’re a regular reader of IQANZ insights and tips, you’ll know just how important governance is to us. As quality assurance specialists, we know one of the best ways to keep projects on track to success is by having a sound approach to governance. Your business case should adeptly outline the role that governance will play in the investment, making mention of things like:

  • The reporting structures of the project throughout its lifespan.
  • The roles and responsibilities of the project and how they’ll be kept accountable.
  • How risks will be monitored and mitigated.
  • The frequency of meetings and communication.
  • How quality will be maintained and reviewed (assurance).

If you’ve got existing governance frameworks in the business, you should work with those responsible and pull already-working practices into your business case, showing that the organisation is well-equipped to deliver a project in this way.

Discuss your business case with us

At IQANZ, we provide assurance around business case development as well as on projects and programmes. By being involved this early, we can help organisations reduce the amount of time spent on any reworking or inefficiencies in their business case. Our team is highly experienced in applying the principles of Better Business Cases, and our knowledge in this space helps more business cases get past the approval stage. If you’re wanting assurance on your own business case, start by contacting our team to discuss.

Where to next?

Read our other business case resources:

Managing risks in a project portfolio 1

The Better Business Case framework explained

What is the Better Business Case Framework? We explain this in our guide.
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Designing a portfolio delivery plan IQANZ

Business Case Sign off process

Progressing a business case through approval involves a number of stakeholders and considerations. We discuss these in our guide.
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Guide to portfolio governance IQANZ

Guide To Writing A Compelling Business Case

Writing a business case should provide a clear, engaging argument for business activity that will drive positive outcomes.
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Business Case Checklist IQANZ

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How To Present A Business Case In Person

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Secret to successful portfolio delivery IQANZ

Why Business Cases Get Denied

Sometimes a business case doesn’t get through the proposal stage. We share some reasons why.
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Prioritising projects in an organisation IQANZ

Reviewing A Business Case

Checking a business case is ready for presentation and approval is more than crossing t’s and dotting i’s. We suggest some ways to ensure a thorough check.
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