Business capabilities
Build a capability hierarchy and use application coverage and maturity to investigate gaps and overlap.
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During Early Access, Atlas does not impose a plan-based limit on the number of capabilities you can create. Workspace permissions and validation still apply.
A business capability is something the organisation needs to be able to do regardless of who does the work or which software they use. A warehouse can keep fulfilling orders after replacing its application. That makes Order fulfilment a useful starting point for discussing the replacement.
Name the business ability
Use a name a business owner would recognise after a reorganisation. Order fulfilment names the ability. Reserve stock and pick the order describes a process. Warehouse operations could name the team, and the warehouse management system is an application. Model each separately so a change of team or software leaves the ability recognisable.
Use a hierarchy
Start with the broad area you want to discuss, such as Order management. Give it children such as Order capture and Order fulfilment when you need to distinguish their support or ownership. Compare siblings at a similar level of detail. Add another level when it would change a decision.
In the pilot navigation, Business Capabilities opens the Business capabilities workbench. With permission to create a top-level capability, choose More, then Add L1, enter the name and select Add.
Link applications
An application can support several capabilities, and a capability can depend on several applications. Link each application to the most specific capability you can confirm. The Capabilities card on the application's fact sheet shows its recorded links. A data object can also link directly to a capability to show which information that ability uses.
On a capability's full page, Supporting Applications shows current and planned links; a link whose Active Until has passed no longer contributes to current support or cost totals. A link without dates is current. A dated link shows its state beside the support details.
Explore the capability workbench
Switch between Map and Table and between As-is and To-be. Select a capability to inspect maturity, linked applications, initiatives and ownership. Selecting a top-level capability summarises its children. Search dims the other tiles so you keep the surrounding context.
Choose one lens at a time. App coverage counts linked applications in the selected state. In To-be, the count omits applications in phase-out, retired applications and those marked Eliminate. In As-is, Gap weights a maturity shortfall by strategic importance. Maturity, Importance, Investment and Owner answer different questions. The legend explains the colours for the selected lens. More also contains import, export, AI drafting and the date control, depending on access.
Compare current and target maturity
On the desktop capability map, select a capability within a top-level group. With overlays enabled, the quick detail shows Current (AS-IS) and Target (TO-BE) on a 1–5 scale. Gap to target is target minus current. A current score of 2 and a target of 4 give a gap of 2. Differences of up to half a point are within the map's target range. A gap is Unknown until both scores are available.
Open View capability and sources for the full record, or use the full record on mobile. Check which source supports an individual score before relying on it. The target records the ambition. Reassess the current score once an initiative has delivered a measurable change.
Use the model in a portfolio discussion
| What you see | What to ask the business owner |
|---|---|
| No linked application | Is the work manual, handled in a local tool or missing from the inventory? |
| Several linked applications | Do they support different regions or steps? Which users and tasks genuinely overlap? |
| The only linked application is leaving | What will cover the ability after retirement, and who will confirm that it works? |
For a worked example connecting the capability to a process, an integration and a decision, see Business architecture.
APQC processes behind a capability
Use APQC's Process Classification Framework (PCF) to relate the organisation's capabilities to standard process references. In the workbench detail panel, each assessed reference has a reason and a strong, partial or thin match. PCF v8.0 covers five levels from categories to tasks. One reference can be Primary and up to three can be Secondary. The primary supplies the APQC external ID. AI-suggested references carry Needs review.
No APQC references assessed yet means the work is outstanding. Not in APQC records an explicit assessment with a reason. With edit access, search by name, hierarchy number or PCF ID. Selecting a new primary moves the previous one to secondary. In Review mode, editing requires an owner or administrator with direct write access. References leave the customer's external identifier and the evidence coverage unchanged.
AI drafting proposes company-specific capabilities and process references. Review them in Populate and follow its link to the change request to approve the capabilities. If reference storage is unavailable, Atlas explains why edits are unavailable. KPI suggestions are currently unavailable.