Capture demand group data
Demand portfolios are defined in Alfabet via demand groups that bundle demands. Each demand can be assigned to multiple demand groups. The demands should be bundled in demand groups that are relevant to the goals for the portfolio assessment process.
The following business questions rely on demand group data:
A license to the extension package Strategic Portfolio Management is required to work with demand groups.
Users with the user profiles Portfolio Manager, and Portfolio Admin can add and edit demand groups in Alfabet. Click for an overview of permission concepts.
You can add a new demand group from anywhere in the product via the orange New button in the header. Or go to Business Architecture > Demand Groups:
- Add a demand group at the top-level of the hierarchy. Click the root node of the explorer and click the New button. The edit panel opens on the right where you can define basic data. The Name attribute is mandatory.
- Create a new demand group as a child (subordinate) of this demand group. Click the parent demand group in the explorer, go to Overview > Subordinate Demand Groups view. Click New > Create New Demand Group.
- Make an existing demand group a child (subordinate) of this demand group. Click the parent demand group in the explorer, go to Overview > Subordinate Demand Groups view. Click New > Move Existing Demand Group Here. A selector opens where you can chose a demand group and move it to this demand group. The demand group you chose is now a child of the demand group you are working with.
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Edit a demand group. Edit the demand group directly in the data table. Or select the checkbox
for the demand group you want to edit and click the Edit 
button to open the edit panel. -
Navigate to the demand group's content area.Click the Navigate
button next to a demand group to open its content area. Specify the demand group's attributes as well as the relationships that the demand group has to other assets in the repository.
Try to capture as much information as possible about the demand group because complete data considerably improves the results of business questions and other analytics.
Once a demand group is in the repository, you can define more details about it in the Demand Groups data workbench.
Per default, the data workbench displays only a set of basic attributes. You can add more columns to capture other attributes directly in the data workbench via the Structure column. Click to learn about how to use data workbenches.
Or you can select an individual demand group in the data workbench and navigate to its content area and specify and analyze the demand group in detail. In the data workbench, click the Navigate button to open the demand group's content area. Go to the Overview page.
Define the demand group's basic data.
- Name: (Mandatory) Enter a meaningful name for the demand group so that users understand its purpose.
- Parent Demand Group: Specify the demand group that is the parent of this demand group in the demand group hierarchy.
- Description: Provide information about the demand group so that other users understand its purpose.
- Authorized Access tab: The user who creates the demand group is the authorized user per default. This can be changed. Select one or more authorized user groups that shall have write permissions to the object. All users in the authorized user group can edit the demand group.
Assigning users and organizations to roles is critical to understanding responsibility for assets in the IT and is required to answer the business question Who is responsible for our assets?.
Responsibilities are based on preconfigured role types. Your company may also configure custom role types via the Portfolio Admin user profile. Depending on the role type, a specified user and/or a specified organization may fulfill the responsibility for the demand group. A user assigned responsibility via a role has read-only permissions to the demand groups. To change data about the demand group, they must also be specified as an authorized user or member of an authorized user group.
Roles can be assigned to a demand group in the Demand Groups data workbench or the demand group content area via Overview > Responsibilities.
Each role column represents the responsibility that a user or organization has for the demand group. A person can have one of the following roles or a custom role added by your company:
- Demand Manager: A person or organization that is responsible for consolidating all demands in a business unit.
- Stakeholder: A person or organization that has an interest in the demand group and therefore requires read-only access permissions.
- Click a column cell to open a selector to define the role for the demand group. Depending on the role column, the selector may have a section for both Person and Organization.
- Expand the relevant section and select the person or organization to assign their role to the demand group.
Demands must already be in the repository in order to assign them to a demand group.
Demand groups logically structure and bundle the demands and allow you to assess the technology portfolio. You can assign demands to multiple demand groups in order to analyze your demands from various perspectives.
Click the navigate button of the demand group to open the content area. Go to Overview > Asset Grouping. In the Demands field, enter the name of the demand you want to assign to the demand group. Or click in the field to open the selector and select each demand that you want to assign to the demand group. Click outside of the selector to close it and update the Asset Grouping field.