When Good Decisions Don’t Add Up to Good Outcomes

Good governance in individual areas does not always add up to good governance of the whole.

Imagine an organisation where every major initiative has an approved business case, an accountable sponsor and an established reporting process.

Yet the organisation has committed to more work than its people can realistically deliver.

Or a business where individual functions are meeting their targets, but decisions made in one area are undermining important objectives elsewhere.

Perhaps the board receives regular financial, operational, risk and project reports, but still struggles to understand whether its most important organisational objectives are on track, what threatens their achievement and where intervention is needed.

These situations are not necessarily the result of poor management or inadequate governance within individual functions.

They may reflect something more fundamental.

The organisation has governance arrangements, but they are not sufficiently connected to support decisions and accountability across the organisation as a whole.

That matters because organisations rarely achieve their objectives through the efforts of one function alone.

Resources are shared. Decisions have consequences beyond the areas in which they are made. Operational commitments compete with investment in change. Product and service development must be reconciled with financial, operational and strategic priorities. Risks and opportunities do not respect organisational boundaries.

The question is not simply whether individual governance processes work. It is whether the organisation has the collective capability to make informed decisions, reconcile competing demands, maintain accountability and achieve its objectives.

How would you recognise an opportunity for better integrated governance?

The need does not always announce itself as a governance problem.

• A CEO might be concerned that the organisation repeatedly fails to deliver against its ambitions.
• A CFO may question whether investment decisions are producing the value expected.
• A portfolio or PMO leader may see too many competing priorities, unstable commitments and insufficient resources.
• A risk professional may recognise that risks are being managed individually without an adequate understanding of their combined implications for business objectives.
• An operational leader may be expected to maintain performance while absorbing change that has been approved elsewhere.
• Or a newly appointed executive might want a more coherent way of directing the organisation towards an ambitious future.

Each sees a different aspect of the organisation. Each may have a legitimate concern or opportunity to pursue.

But are these separate problems requiring separate solutions? Or are there weaknesses in the connections between strategy, governance, accountability, information, decisions and delivery?

We should not assume that more integrated governance is always the answer. We should, however, be capable of recognising when it is a critical part of the answer.

And we need a constructive way of investigating that possibility.

From recognising the opportunity to establishing the capability

Business Integrated Governance (BIG) provides a framework for considering governance as an enduring interconnected, organisational capability rather than a collection of separate structures, functions and activities.

It recognises that organisations must continuously balance the demands of running the business, implementing change and creating value.

It also brings together principles, components, concepts and guidance to help organisations connect their purpose, vision and strategy to the decisions, resources, accountability and activities through which objectives are achieved.

BIG is not a replacement for established professional disciplines, governance arrangements or management methods.

Nor is adopting BIG an end in itself.

It offers a means of understanding how existing capabilities can work together more effectively, where connections or capabilities may be missing, and what improvements could help an organisation achieve its strategic objectives.

The scale of improvement may be modest or substantial. The starting point might be a particular organisational objective, a recurring decision-making problem, a functional improvement opportunity or a wider executive ambition.

What matters is understanding the need and establishing an appropriate response.

Throughout 2026, the BIG Body of Knowledge Club has explored many of the principles and components involved. Our earlier BIG Leadership discussion also considered how leaders recognise the need for improvement, build support and sustain commitment.

For our final two sessions of the year, we want to bring this thinking together around two practical questions:

Where do we begin, and what needs to exist to make integrated governance work and endure?

Join the discussion

The final two sesisons of this first BIG BoK series explore how to recognise opportunities for integrated governance, establish what is needed to build an enduring organisational capability.

You might be a board member concerned about achieving mission-critical objectives. A CEO seeking better organisational alignment. A finance leader questioning investment performance. A PMO leader facing constant priority conflicts. A risk professional seeking better connections between risk and objectives. Or someone who simply believes the organisation could work more effectively as a whole.

If any of these situations resonate, we would welcome your perspective.

You can attend either session independently, although together they provide a fuller exploration of the journey from recognising an opportunity to establishing an enduring capability.

Join us for the final two BIG Body of Knowledge Club sessions of 2026:

November 30^th 7.30 pm: The BIG Journey: From Readiness to Enduring Capability – Why aren’t the decisions and arrangements producing the outcomes we need? How do we understand the situation and find a way forward?

December 7th 7.30 pm: Building a BIG Capability: What Actually Needs to Exist? What needs to work together to improve those outcomes, and how do we make the capability endure?

Together, they explore the progression from an organisational situation that deserves attention to the enduring governance capability that could help address it.

These are not intended to be prescriptive presentations or exercises in promoting a framework.

The BIG BoK Club exists to bring together experience and knowledge from across professional disciplines, challenge assumptions and develop understanding of how integrated governance can work in practice.

We want to learn from people who have encountered these situations, whether their experiences have been successful, frustrating or still unresolved.

Find out more about Business Integrated Governance CIC and the BIG BoK Club.

Get involved with BIG CIC

Business Integrated Governance CIC is a UK not-for-profit professional knowledge organisation, developing and sharing knowledge to help organisations improve governance and the achievement of their objectives.

We do not seek to replace established professional disciplines. Our role is to help people recognise, connect and apply the knowledge and capabilities needed to make the organisation work effectively as a whole.

You can explore our work and participate through:

• BIG Membership: Join the community, participate in discussions and access developing knowledge. – Explore BIG Membership
• BIG Partners and Professional Members: Find practitioners and organisations offering relevant specialist expertise.
• BIG Solution Providers: Explore tools and services that can support integrated governance. – Explore BIG Solutions

Our invitation is simple: help us connect the good practice that already exists and make strategy implementation a dependable part of how organisations work.