Capability goals

Capabilities are Forest's source of truth, and capability goals are where the roadmap becomes real work. A capability goal sets a target maturity for a single discrete function, such as Identity Provisioning or Patch Management, and assigns the gap to someone who can close it.

This is the level where priority is actually computed. Forest takes the target maturity, subtracts current maturity, and multiplies by the capability's criticality. A two-step climb on a compliance-required capability outranks a two-step climb on a nice-to-have, and the ordering falls out of the formula rather than opinion.

Writing a strong capability goal means being specific about the move:

1. Confirm current maturity from the CAMP assessment, using the 0 to 5 scale where 2 is Managed and 4 is Quantitative.

2. Set a target maturity that reflects how good this function needs to be, not the maximum possible.

3. Check criticality. A target on a criticality 3 capability will rank high; a target on a criticality 1 may be worth deferring.

4. Assign an owner and tie it to a milestone date.

Targets do not have to be 5. Pushing every capability to Optimized is expensive and rarely justified. Set the target at the maturity the function genuinely requires, then let priority sort the order.

Capability goals also surface tool and spend issues, since this is the level where capabilities map to the tools meant to deliver them. Recommendations are generated here, from CAMP priority and deterministic rules. Roll your capability goals up into domain goals and assign them across execution lanes.