While many organizations focus on technology, data, and capabilities, it’s the governance structures that align strategy with execution, enable informed decision-making, and ensure accountability. Without effective governance, even the most promising digital or AI initiatives risk becoming fragmented, misaligned, or unsustainable.

This article explores how governance typically evolves during transformation, drawing on a framework presented in GAIN by Michael Wade and Amit Joshi (2025). It then outlines best practices and tools for establishing effective governance at every level of transformation—portfolio, program, and project.

The Governance Journey: From Silo to Anchored Agility
Wade and Joshi identify four phases in the evolution of transformation governance:

• Silo: In this early phase, digital and AI initiatives are isolated within departments. There is little coordination across the organization, leading to duplicated efforts and fragmented progress.
• Chaos: As a reaction to the issues with the siloed approach, often companies start putting governance in place—but often not very effectively. Leading to a proliferation of processes, tools and platforms.
• Bureaucracy: In response to chaos, organizations implement formal governance structures. While this reduces risk and increases control, it can also stifle innovation through over-regulation and sluggish decision-making.
• Anchored Agility: The desired end-state. Governance becomes a strategic enabler—embedded yet flexible. It ensures alignment and control without constraining innovation. Decision-making is delegated appropriately, while strategic oversight is maintained.

Most organisations go through this journey, understanding where your organization is helps to determine what kind of actions are needed and what to improve.

Effective Governance: Moving from Bureaucracy to Anchored Agility
Most successful digital and AI transformations mature into the Bureaucracy and Anchored Agility phases. These are the phases where effective governance must strike a balance between structure and adaptability.

Two proven approaches—PMI and Agile—offer best practices to draw from:

PMI Governance Best Practices

• Well-defined roles and responsibilities across governance layers
• Program and project charters to formalize scope, authority, and accountability
• Clear stage gates, with decision points tied to strategic goals
• Risk, issue, and change control mechanisms
• Standard reporting templates to ensure transparency and comparability

PMI’s approach works best in large, complex transformations that require strong coordination, predictable delivery, and control of interdependencies.

Agile Governance Principles

• Empowered teams with clear decision rights
• Frequent review cadences (e.g., sprint reviews, retrospectives, and PI planning)
• Lightweight governance bodies focused on alignment, not control
• Transparent backlogs and prioritization frameworks
• Adaptability built into the governance process itself

Agile governance is ideal for fast-evolving digital or AI initiatives where experimentation, speed, and responsiveness are critical.

Moving from Bureaucracy to Anchored Agility, is not moving away from PMI to only Agile Governance principles. Your portfolio probably will have mix of initiatives which leverages one or both of the approaches.

Governance Across Levels: Portfolio, Program, Project
A layered governance model helps ensure alignment from strategy to execution:

Portfolio Level

• Purpose: Strategic alignment, investment decisions, and value realization
• Key Bodies: Executive Steering Committees, Digital/AI Portfolio Boards
• Focus Areas: Prioritization, funding, overall risk and performance tracking

Program Level

• Purpose: Coordinating multiple related projects and initiatives
• Key Bodies: Program Boards or Program Management Offices
• Focus Areas: Interdependencies, resource allocation, milestone tracking, issue resolution

Project Level

• Purpose: Delivering tangible outcomes on time and on budget
• Key Bodies: Project SteerCos, Agile team ceremonies
• Focus Areas: Daily execution, scope management, risk and issue tracking, delivery cadence

Connecting the Layers: How Governance Interacts and Cascades
Effective governance requires more than clearly defined levels—it demands a dynamic flow of information and accountability across these layers. Strategic priorities must be translated into executable actions, while insights from execution must feed back into strategic oversight.

• Top-down alignment: Portfolio governance sets strategic objectives, funding allocations, and key performance indicators. These are cascaded to programs and projects through charters, planning sessions, and KPIs.
• Bottom-up reporting: Project teams surface risks, status updates, and learnings which are aggregated at the program level and escalated to the portfolio when needed.
• Horizontal coordination: Programs often interact and depend on each other. Governance forums at program level and joint planning sessions across programs help manage these interdependencies.
• Decision and escalation pathways: Clear routes for issue resolution and decision-making prevent bottlenecks and ensure agility across layers.

Organizations that master this governance flow operate with greater transparency, speed, and alignment.

Tools and Enablers for Good Governance
Governance is not just about structure—it’s also about enabling practices and tools that make oversight effective and efficient:

• Terms of Reference (ToR): Define the mandate, decision rights, and meeting cadence for each governance body.
• Collaboration & Transparency Tools: Use of platforms like Asana, Confluence, Jira, MS Teams for sharing updates, tracking decisions, and managing workflows.
• Standardized Reporting: Leverage consistent templates for status, risks, and KPIs to create transparency and drive focus.
• RACI Matrices: Clarify roles and decision-making authority across stakeholders, especially in cross-functional setups.
• Governance Calendars: Synchronize key reviews, steerco meetings, and strategic checkpoints across layers.

Lessons from the Field
From my experience, common governance pitfalls include over-engineering (which stifles agility), under-resourcing (especially at the program level), and slow/unclear decision making. Successful governance relies on:

• Aligned executive sponsorship
• Clear ownership at all levels
• Integration of risk, value, and resource management
• Enabling people to act

Conclusion
In digital and AI transformation, effective governance is not about control—it’s about enablement. It provides the structure and transparency needed to drive transformation, align stakeholders, and scale success. As your organization moves toward Anchored Agility, governance becomes less of a bottleneck and more of a backbone.

Where is your organization on the governance journey—and what would it take to reach the next phase?