However, the following list has some of the common criteria mentioned in the literature: The criteria can be anything you feel appropriate for evaluating the items to be prioritized. There should be more than one criteria (preferably 3+ to get the most benefit from this process). The Criteria you use for Matrix Prioritization should be relevant to all of the items in your evaluation set. An example of this is included in the How do I do it? section below. However, you could also deal with dependency issues by assigning a dependency criteria to the analysis process for each item that indicates the level of dependency of that item on other items in the set. In addition to being able to be rated on a consistent set of criteria (consistent among all of the items rated, not every time you need to prioritize a set of something), the items should all be at the same level of abstraction so that the rating evaluations are all made using the same approximate level of information.Īdditionally, Karl Wiegers recommends that if specific items in your set are dependent (for example, if you would only consider item X if item Z was included), include only the driving item in the analysis. Almost anything else that needs to be prioritized.Matrix prioritization can be applied to any set of items that can all be evaluated by a consistent set of criteria.

These components are described in more detail below.

Formula - The formula selected to generate a priority value for each item based on the Criteria and Weightings.Weightings - The relative weighting applied to each criteria.Value Scales - These are the scale of possible values that can be used to specify the relationship of an item to the criteria being evaluated.Criteria - The varying criteria that will be used to evaluate each item.Item Set - The items that are being evaluated for the prioritization effort.Matrix Prioritization efforts are made up of five different components, which are: It is also very similar to the Decision Matrix technique (aka Problem Matrix, Solution Matrix), but instead of resulting in a single preferred outcome the Matrix Prioritization technique results in a list of all evaluated items ranked by priority. The most common implementation of this technique among Business Analyst's is probably Wiegers Prioritization Matrix (WPM hereafter for brevity). The concepts behind it can be traced back to work done on Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Total Quality Management (TQM) among others, and there are several variations in how the technique can be executed. Matrix Prioritization is a general-purpose multi-factor prioritization technique that results in a ratio-scale output. And if that occurs, then either everything your clients prioritize will be the highest priority or they simply will no longer cooperate because they have lost confidence in the process.Īlso known as: Prioritization Matrix, Wiegers Prioritization Matrix, Wiegers Prioritization Method, Prioritization Matrix according to Wiegers If stakeholders consistently see that all that will implemented are the highest priority items, then soon they will stop believing that priority levels mean anything and that everything that is not flagged as the highest priority will not get implemented. IMPORTANT! If you are going to use any prioritization method, be sure that you actually implement more than just the highest level of priority items.

Benefits of priority matrix