Investing with Purpose: How Participatory Budgeting Drives Portfolio Alignment - Luke Homann

Hosted by Renaud Granier (https://www.linkedin.com/in/renaud-granier/), live from the SAFe & AI Summit 2026 in Amsterdam, this episode of Agile Amped features Luke Homann, SAFe Fellow and architect of the Lean Portfolio Management competency. Luke explains how portfolio investment decisions hinge on three dimensions of value customer, organizational, and cost and how SAFe's investment horizons (zero through three) help executive teams balance short-term returns with long-term strategic bets. The often-overlooked Horizon Zero covers the intentional decommissioning of legacy systems that can't simply be switched off. At the heart of the conversation is participatory budgeting not just as a funding mechanism, but as a powerful communication tool. Through a real-world example with Verisign, Luke shows how underfunded initiatives fail not because of poor strategy, but because of poor explanation. When the leadership team finally communicated clearly, near-universal support followed and implementation accelerated immediately. Luke also introduces Horizon Invest, his new participatory budgeting tool built on consent-based voting protocols inspired by holacracy designed to help executive teams reach investment decisions as a unit, preventing the organizational friction that arises when leaders quietly second-guess collective decisions. The training edition is free and available now. His key message: the same principles driving citizen engagement in public budgeting are just as powerful inside companies striving to align strategy with execution. Making the decision-making process visible and participatory is what creates real organizational hustle. Connect with Luke Homann: • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lukehohmann/ • Website: https://invest.appliedframeworks.com/ • Website: https://appliedframeworks.com/