In ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM), a Program is the specific entity designed to group related projects and demands. This allows for coordinated management to achieve strategic benefits that would not be available by managing them individually. The itprogrammanager role is explicitly granted the necessary permissions to create, view, and manage these programs. This role utilizes tools like the Program Workbench to oversee the health and progress of all constituent projects and demands within the program, ensuring alignment with organizational objectives.

B. itprojectmanager: This role is responsible for managing individual projects, not the higher-level program structure that groups them.

C. itdemandmanager: This role focuses on the intake, assessment, and qualification of demands before they are approved and converted into projects.

D. itprojectuser: This is a stakeholder role with limited, typically read-only, access to project information and does not have creation or management rights.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Create a program: "As a program manager, create a program to group related projects and demands to manage and track them collectively." This document directly links the action of grouping projects and demands to the program manager role. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, Washington D.C. Release, Project Portfolio Management > Program Management > Create a program).

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Roles in Project Portfolio Management: This page defines the responsibilities of key roles. It states the itprogrammanager "Has the ability to create and manage programs. Has access to the Program Workbench." In contrast, it defines the itprojectmanager as having the ability to manage projects and the itdemandmanager as having the ability to manage demands. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, Washington D.C. Release, Project Portfolio Management > Reference > Roles in Project Portfolio Management).

The ppsresource role is specifically designed to designate a user as a resource within the ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) application. When a user is assigned this role, they become available for resource management activities. This means they can be included in resource plans, have their capacity and availability tracked, and be allocated to demands, projects, and other operational work. Without this specific role, a user will not appear in the lists of available resources for planning and allocation by resource or project managers.

A. itprojectuser: This role provides read-only access to project-related information. It does not designate the user as a plannable resource.

B. ituser: This is a generic, foundational role for IT users and is not specific to resource management or the SPM suite.

C. itppsuser: This role grants general access to the Project Portfolio Suite (PPS) applications but does not specifically mark the user as a resource for planning purposes.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation: Roles in Strategic Portfolio Management. In the table describing roles, the ppsresource role is defined as: "Users who can be requested as a resource on a resource plan. Any user with this role is considered a resource." This document also clarifies that itppsuser is for general access and itprojectuser is for viewing project information. (ServiceNow Vancouver Release Documentation, Strategic Portfolio Management, "Roles in Strategic Portfolio Management" section).

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation: Components installed with Resource Management. This page lists the roles installed with the Resource Management plugin, explicitly stating that the ppsresource role is for users who can be requested as resources. (ServiceNow Vancouver Release Documentation, Resource Management, "Components installed with Resource Management" section).

The ppsresourceuser role is explicitly required for a user to be considered a resource within the ServiceNow Resource Management application. Assigning this role makes the user available for resource planning, allowing resource managers to find them, view their capacity, and allocate them to resource plans and project tasks. Without this role, a user will not appear in the resource finder or be available for allocation, even if they are part of a resource group.

A. timecarduser: This role permits users to create and submit their own time cards for tracking work hours, but it does not designate them as a plannable resource.

C. resourcemanager: This is a management role. It grants permissions to create resource plans, request resources, and manage allocations, but it is not assigned to the individuals being allocated.

D. ratemodeluser: This role is related to financial management, allowing a user to view rate models that determine the cost of resources. It has no bearing on a user's availability for resource planning.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Resource Management roles:

The documentation explicitly states for the ppsresourceuser role: "Users with this role are considered for resource planning. The role does not contain any other roles." This directly confirms that this role is the one required for a user to be a plannable resource.

Source: ServiceNow Product Documentation, "Resource Management roles," Rome release.

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Components installed with Resource Management:

This document lists the roles installed with the Resource Management plugin. It specifies the ppsresourceuser role and its purpose, reinforcing that users with this role are the ones considered for resource planning.

Source: ServiceNow Product Documentation, "Components installed with Resource Management," Rome release.

In ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM), the risk rank, also commonly referred to as the risk score, is a calculated value used to quantify and prioritize risks associated with a project or portfolio. This calculation adheres to standard risk management principles. The formula multiplies the assessed probability (the likelihood of the risk event occurring) by the assessed impact (the severity of the consequences if the event occurs). This product provides a quantitative score that helps stakeholders understand the magnitude of the risk and focus their mitigation efforts on the most critical items.

A. priority impact: Priority is typically an outcome of risk assessment, not an input. It is often determined by the calculated risk score itself.

B. urgency impact: This formula is standard in ServiceNow for calculating the priority of incidents (ITSM), not for assessing project or strategic risks (SPM).

C. priority urgency: This combination is not a standard formula for calculating risk. Urgency and priority are distinct concepts in risk and issue management.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Project Workspace: In the section describing the risk heatmap, it states, "The risk heatmap is a graphical representation of risks in a project. The x-axis represents the impact and the y-axis represents the probability of the risks." This confirms that probability and impact are the two core components for assessing and visualizing risk level. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, "View and manage project risks in Project Workspace", Vancouver release).

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Risk Management (GRC): The underlying principle is consistent across the platform. The documentation for Risk Assessments explains that the qualitative score is derived from impact and likelihood values. "The qualitative score is calculated based on the values you select in the Impact and Likelihood fields." Probability is synonymous with likelihood in this context. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, "Perform a basic risk assessment", Vancouver release).

3. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Create a project risk: The standard form for creating a project risk (pmrisk) includes distinct fields for Probability and Impact. The Risk score is a calculated field based on the values selected for these two inputs, demonstrating the direct Probability Impact relationship. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, "Create a project risk", Vancouver release).

The property com.snc.project.updateactualeffortfromtimecard is a system property that is configured globally. This means it applies to the entire ServiceNow instance and affects all projects uniformly. When enabled (set to true), the 'Actual effort' field on all project tasks is automatically updated based on the hours submitted via associated time cards. This control is not granularly available at the individual project, program, or portfolio level; it is a single, application-wide setting managed by an administrator.

B. Portfolio Level: This setting is not managed on the portfolio record. System properties like this one govern behavior across the entire application, not specific portfolios.

C. Program Level: Similar to portfolios, this property is not configured at the program level. The functionality is enabled or disabled for all projects, regardless of program affiliation.

D. Project Level: This is a system-wide property, not a field or related list on the individual project form. A project cannot independently override this global setting.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation: "Project properties"

The documentation lists com.snc.project.updateactualeffortfromtimecard as a system property. The description states, "Enable to update the actual effort of a project task from the time card." System properties (sysproperties table) are, by definition, global settings that apply to the entire application instance unless explicitly designed to be overridden, which this one is not. This confirms the control is at the Application (Global) level.

In the ServiceNow Demand Management application, the lifecycle process is initiated when a demand is moved from the 'Draft' state to the 'Submitted' state. This state transition serves as the default trigger to automatically generate and send assessment questionnaires to the defined stakeholders. The data collected from these assessments, which typically evaluate metrics like risk, strategic alignment, and value, is essential for the demand manager to perform a thorough evaluation during the subsequent 'Screening' and 'Qualified' states.

A. Approved: Assessments are a prerequisite for the approval decision; they must be completed long before the demand reaches the 'Approved' state.

B. Screening: The results of the assessments are a key input for the 'Screening' state; therefore, the assessments must be triggered before this state begins.

C. Qualified: This state occurs after 'Screening'. By this point, the initial stakeholder assessments should have already been triggered and likely completed.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Demand states: "When a demand is created, it is in the Draft state. When the demand is ready for the demand manager to review, the demand is moved to the Submitted state. Stakeholders receive assessment questionnaires to assess the demand." This confirms that the 'Submitted' state is the trigger. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, Washington DC Release, Demand Management, "Demand states").

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Assess a demand: "When a demand is in the Submitted state, assessment questionnaires are sent to the stakeholders to assess the demand on different metrics such as risk, and value." This explicitly links the 'Submitted' state to the triggering of assessments. (ServiceNow Product Documentation, Washington DC Release, Demand Management, "Assess a demand").

The Compare Baselines page within the new Project Workspace is the designated feature for analyzing financial performance over time. It allows a project manager to take a snapshot of the initial plan (the baseline) and compare it against the current planned costs, actuals, and forecasts. This comparison is presented in a time-phased grid, enabling a clear month-over-month analysis of variances between the original budget and the latest financial data, which is the exact requirement stated in the question.

A. Using the Cost plan breakdown form: This form displays the detailed fiscal period breakdown for a single cost plan, not a comparison between the current plan and a historical baseline.

B. Using the Financials Cost page: This page provides a summary of the project's current cost plans and actuals but does not offer the specific functionality to compare these against a saved baseline.

D. Using the project Details page: This page shows high-level project attributes, status, and metadata. It does not contain detailed financial comparison tools or time-phased cost data.

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1. ServiceNow Product Documentation: Compare project baselines in Project Workspace. This document explicitly states, "Compare the current cost and benefit plan values of your project with a selected baseline to view the variance... The comparison is shown in a time-phased grid for the selected fiscal period." This directly supports the use of the Compare Baselines page for month-over-month comparison.

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation: Financial planning for projects and demands in Project Workspace. This guide details the financial management capabilities within the workspace, highlighting the "Compare Baselines" action as the method for tracking performance against the original plan.

3. ServiceNow Product Documentation: Create a project baseline in Project Workspace. This document defines a baseline as "a snapshot of the project's cost plan, benefit plan, and all the planned dates... at a specific point in time." This confirms that the "initial planned costs" are stored in a baseline, which is then used for comparison.

The question asks for an allocation spread to use when hours should not be distributed equally. ServiceNow Resource Management provides specific allocation types for resource plans. The 'Even' spread distributes hours equally across the plan's duration. To achieve an unequal distribution, the project manager must choose either 'Front Load,' which allocates more hours at the beginning of the plan, or 'Back Load,' which allocates more hours toward the end. Both options fulfill the stated requirement of not distributing hours equally.

A. Even: This option directly contradicts the requirement, as it is designed specifically to distribute hours equally over the time frame.

B. Any: This is not a valid, configurable allocation spread type within the ServiceNow platform. While conceptually the project manager could use "any" of the non-even methods, it is not a selectable option.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Create a resource plan: "The allocation type for the resource plan.

Even load: Distributes the allocated hours evenly across the duration of the resource plan.

Front load: Allocates more hours at the beginning of the resource plan.

Back load: Allocates more hours at the end of the resource plan."

This documentation explicitly lists 'Front Load' and 'Back Load' as the methods for non-even distribution.

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Resource allocation: "You can allocate resources to a project or a demand by creating a resource plan. You can also modify the resource plan to change the allocation of resources... The allocation type for the resource plan: Even load, Front load, or Back load."

This confirms the specific, limited set of allocation types available, from which 'Front Load' and 'Back Load' are the only non-even options.

The imcategory table is the default table in ServiceNow's Idea Management application specifically designed to store the categories for ideas. When an administrator configures Idea Management, they create records in this table. These records then populate the 'Category' choice list on the idea submission form, enabling users to classify their ideas appropriately. This categorization is crucial for organizing, searching, and routing ideas to the correct evaluation teams. The im prefix is standard for tables within the Idea Management application.

A. dmndemand: This table stores demand records. An idea may be promoted to a demand, but this table does not store the initial idea categories.

C. immodule: This table is used to configure different idea portals or "modules," allowing for separate idea submission processes, not the categories themselves.

D. imideacore: This is the core table that stores the actual idea records submitted by users, not the predefined list of categories they can select from.

1. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Create an idea category: This official document outlines the process for creating idea categories. The navigation path provided, Idea > Administration > Categories, directly corresponds to the imcategory table.

Reference: ServiceNow Product Documentation, "Create an idea category," Rome release.

2. ServiceNow Product Documentation - Tables installed with Idea Management: This document explicitly lists the tables associated with the Idea Management application. It defines the imcategory table with the label "Idea Category" and the purpose "Stores idea categories."

Reference: ServiceNow Product Documentation, "Tables installed with Idea Management," Washington DC release.

3. ServiceNow Developer Documentation - Table imcategory: The developer site provides the schema details for the application tables. The imcategory table is listed with the application scope "Idea Management" and is clearly identified as the table for "Idea Category."

Reference: ServiceNow Developer Site, Application: Idea Management, Table: Idea Category (imcategory).