Roll-Up Schemes Are Everywhere
Organizations rarely operate with a single hierarchy
Technology organizations use all kinds of categorization schemes to make sense of things. They differentiate capital expenditures from operating expenses. They might bucket work by investment horizon. They might divide up their initiatives into “delighters” and “table stakes,” or “run the business, improve the business, change the business.”
Your average organization can have a dozen of these schemes running at the same time. Some are legally required (like capex and opex), while others come in and out of favor.
Most of these schemes involve “DAG-like” (or “tree-like”) structures with leaves leading to branches, leading to trunks. They are designed for “roll-ups,” similar to how the expense subcategories and categories in your personal accounting tool are designed for roll-ups.
Managed or Not?
Categorization schemes are important. The key thing boils down to whether they are managed.
It is the difference between actively trying to “manage” where you spend your money with a monthly budget and reviews, and simply having an expense and income roll-up scheme that categorizes your spending and income.
The key point here is that companies almost never have a single roll-up scheme, even if they pretend they do.