Visualizing Portfolios: Prompt Discussions and Provoke Debates in Management Meetings

Portfolio perspectives are fundamental for executives, and visual approaches provide an accessible means of conveying summary overviews and in-depth depictions of projects, programs, and platforms. However, within organizations, the design of such charts, diagrams, and graphs is relatively poor. Given the importance of portfolios, visualizations should be more thoughtfully designed to better present information in expressive ways while ensuring an appropriate balance of data provision aligned with the needs of the audience/viewers. Visuals are not merely a method of reporting, they can also be strategically deployed to support decision-making. Visualizations can be used to trigger and structure the necessary conversations between managers and executives, enabling much-needed discussions and even healthy debates. This article presents a selection of visuals that were developed to depict different types and aspects of portfolios as a means to prompt meaningful and constructive dialog among key stakeholders—especially in management meetings (either online or in-person). These visualizations act as exemplars of new and novel practices in leading organizations and provide both useful representations and inspiration for other companies.