A driver is an objective that the business would like to achieve, often representing a change from the status quo. It may include principles that guide action, or more tangible and measurable goals and strategies that describe the expected results in measurable terms.
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The driver is not a project plan. It does not specify how the objective is to be achieved.
A driver can exist at any level of the organization, from top level principles ("Quality is Job One") to department level objectives.("Defect rate for standard widgets to drop below 1% and stay there for three months").
A driver may enable another driver (If the widget department meets their objectives, then we can drop our reworking costs by 15% in the third month.) In addition, a driver may influence another driver: ("With the push for quality in the widget division, the thingamabob division has set new goals for 2012.").
Drivers may be inspired directly by influencers like competitive pressure or business trends or they may be suggested in a business model assessment. It is important to know the source of the driver and what it is responding to, in order to understand relative importance and check the assumptions on which a driver is based.
Note that a stakeholder, in some cases, can be considered a driver. In this case, the stakeholder is not an external influence, but rather a person with a level of leadership and credibility in the business sufficient to inspire goals and objectives that others will follow.
A capability roadmap is a special case form of driver, in that it is a coordinated series of specific changes that should be met, often in a specific order, in order to meet the demands of a higher level driver. Note that a capability roadmap is not a project plan.
At any level, a driver sets an objective for some part of the organization. Business programs may be formed to bring these objectives to life.
A driver is a core element of the Enterprise Business Motivation Model.