from sharing it.Ī report that can be completely automated and takes simply a few minutes to produce can help you save time and provide a professional and useful status report to keep everyone up to date on your project progress. The report could be a waste of your time if the audience doesn’t see value in the report and if the Project Manager doesn’t receive any value, like guidance, advice, etc.
TIME WASTED UPDATE
Every time you need to prepare for a status update meeting, your project status report is at least half a day behind, the minute you begin the meeting. If you have to go looking into multiple places, like documents, notebooks, spreadsheets, emails, and more to obtain your information and data, then it could easily take half a day to pull all the information needed into a project status template. This effort may appear to be useful if you go by the adage, “more data in the report makes it more valuable”, but this can also be problematic. Get out in front of what your sponsor has clearly let you know, they care about.Īccurate, timely and up-to-date information in the project status report, provides the best input to help make key decisions and to decide next best steps.Ī project status report that involves multiple presentation slides and numerous pieces of data, and takes many hours of the Project Manager’s time to put together. If the template can’t be changed, add your own separate piece. As Project Managers, if you’ve been using the standard status report for some time now, and you find the sponsor is asking about specific aspects of the project in most status meetings, change the status report to include that aspect to better meet the needs of your sponsor and the project overall. Ensure your sponsor has agreed with the information and metrics that will be included in the Project Status Report, before the first one is presented.Ī good project status reportshould be flexible, have a consistent format and be concise. With your input and experience, give the “customer” what they want (within reason). Your sponsor or client and other key stakeholders should be the ones to provide guidance on the information needed in the project status update.
Some of your earliest meetings with your sponsor or client should include a discussion about the information in the project status report and how often they expect to receive one. Some of your earliest meetings with your sponsor or client should include a discussion about the information they would like to see in the project status report, and how often they expect to receive the status update. At least with a peer, but better with a senior manager or experienced person representing a PMO. Don’t put a project status report in front of a sponsor or client, without a review. The project status report enables the Project Manager to report with confidence and show they are in control of the project and can predict future success.Ī key step in the process is the project status report review. This use of the draft status report, to obtain advice or get a second opinion, is an intelligent use of the information by the Project Manager and results in more successful status meetings.
The Project Manager can provide a draft of the report, which indicates their opinion on aspects of the project, like overall status GYR (Green, Yellow or Red), the status of various areas of work, or their confidence in the project completing to plan. The project status report can be a “discussion starter” between the Project Manager and their manager, the Project Management Office (PMO) or their project team. This use of the draft status report, to obtain advice or get a second opinion, is an intelligent use of the information by the Project Manager.Īnother use for a status report, is related to helping the Project Manager be more successful. Of course, many other aspects of the project can also be reported on including issues and action items and next steps. The report implies “work” progress and the current status of the planned tasks, schedule and budget. Generally speaking, the main use of a project status report is to regularly communicate where we are with our project work to date, compared to the plan.
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