Strategy

Pillars and Themes form the strategic architecture of your StartConsole workspace. They are the top two levels of the hierarchy, sitting above OKRs and initiatives. Everything in your portfolio — every goal, every initiative, every budget line — connects upward to a pillar.

Pillars

A Pillar is a top-level strategic priority. It represents a broad direction or area of strategic focus for your organisation. Pillars do not change frequently — they reflect the leadership team's view of what matters most over a multi-year horizon.

Pillar fields

Field	Description
Name	The name of the strategic priority. Maximum 100 characters. Displayed in the portfolio filter bar and all reporting views.
Description	Optional. A plain-language explanation of what this pillar covers and why it matters. Maximum 500 characters. Displayed on the pillar detail view.

Pillar limits

The number of pillars you can create depends on your plan. Most organisations find that 4–7 pillars is the right number to maintain meaningful differentiation. Fewer than 4 risks conflating distinct priorities; more than 8 makes the portfolio filter bar unwieldy.

How pillars appear

Pillars appear in:

• The portfolio filter bar — click a pillar name to filter the initiative list to that pillar
• The roadmap view — use the Group by Pillar option to organise the timeline by strategic priority
• The signals page — filter signals by pillar to see health observations on a specific strategic area
• The dashboard — the Value Alignment Score chart shows investment distribution across pillars

Themes

A Theme is a sub-category within a pillar — a more specific area of focus that groups related initiatives. Themes add an organisational layer without adding governance complexity.

A theme belongs to exactly one pillar. You can have multiple themes within a pillar.

Theme fields

Field	Description
Name	The name of the theme. Maximum 100 characters. Displayed in the initiative list and filter bar.
Colour	A colour label used to visually distinguish themes in list views and the roadmap. Select from the available colour palette.
Pillar	The pillar this theme belongs to. Required. A theme cannot exist without a parent pillar.

Theme limits

There is no hard limit on the number of themes per pillar, but for usability, keep themes to a manageable number — typically 3–6 per pillar. Themes that are too granular add noise without adding clarity.