Project Management Book

As a principle we should never report only our opinion nor should we only report bald numbers - always both, just as in company accounts.

Project managers often track and manage work on the basis of hours worked and tasks done. However, we also need to know how much money has been spent. If we only have half the number of people we should have, we could be way underspent on our budget to date. At the same time, if we have more (expensive!) contractors than expected the costs of tasks completed could be way over in cash terms.

Whether money spent is just people's time converted to money (by the project office) or money spent is only cash expenditures such as contractors, equipment and travel, or both added together, or whether each is tracked separately, etc is one of the myriad decision you must make before your project starts.

PMR for Project: Project XYZ							Report Month: June
Project Manager: I.Goodboss							Author: A.T.Leader
1.STATUS SUMMARY vs LATEST APPROVED PLAN							RAG status: AMBER
YES	NO
yes			Will the Project products meet specifications?
yes			Will products be delivered on approved schedule?
yes			Are External commitments being honoured?
yes			Are External relationships satisfactory?
yes			Will the project milestones be met?
+ 10%	- %		Project hours to date as + or - percent of plan
+ %	- 33%		Completed Tasks to date, as + or - percent of plan
+ 20%	- %		Hours for Completed Tasks as + or - percent of plan
+ %	- %		Project £ spent to date as + or - percent of plan
+ %	- %		Cost of Completed Tasks as + or - percent of plan
2. PLAN vs ACTUAL?				THIS MONTH Plan Actual		TO DATE Plan Actual
Hours						4000			4400
Tasks Completed						174			117
£
IT headcount
User headcount
Other headcount
3.OUTLOOK TO COMPLETION
		Original Plan			Latest Approved Plan Date approved: May 1st			Current Outlook
End Date		October 31st			November 30th			December 14th
Tasks		360			390			402
Hours		8000			9000			9250
£		£360K			£405K			£420K

The middle section, section 2, essentially gives the raw numbers from which the percentages in section 1 are derived (we haven't filled in all the numbers).

Section 3, however, is what the sponsor most wants to know. What is Section 3 telling us? We originally thought we'd finish by October 31st. On May 1st, two months ago (let's say it's July 1st today), the sponsor approved a move to November 30th and a budget increase to £405K - that's the current commitment. But as of today, July 1st, our best guess is that we're going to be 2 weeks late and it'll cost £420K which is £15K more than our latest approved budget.

How do you feel about this project? It's slipped once, it's sliding again and the current status would probably make us very suspicious about their projections anyway. And if we felt really nervous we might even want to consider commissioning a Health Check. What's your gut feeling? A, B, C or D? If you believe the Current Outlook probably a C. But if, given they are at the moment 33% behind on task completions and completed tasks have cost 20% more than expected and you suspected they had not properly factored that into the outlook, maybe you'd be thinking D. If there is doubt about project status experienced project managers tend to assume the worst case until somebody proves to them it really ain't that bad. Starry eyed, inexperienced young optimists hope for the best, let things run and then get very nasty shocks later in the project.

5.PCR STATUS SUMMARY						Hours		£
Spent investigating PCRs to date						200		9,000
Allocated to approved PCRs to date						670		30,150
So, total to date on PCRs COMMITTED & SPENT						870		39,150
In current approved plan, total PCR BUDGET						800		36,000
Total PCR expenditure, estimated OUTLOOK						1500		67,500
number submitted		number approved		number	number under		Number not
month	to date	month	to date	rejected	evaluation		looked at
							24

There was a budget of £36K for change which has already been overspent and they are outlooking a change spend of more like £67K by the time they finish - they are going to spend almost twice as much on change than they allowed for.

The person reporting then tells you there are 24 change requests sitting on his desk that he hasn't even had time to look at yet. Not good. That D is definitely looking favourite.

...chapter 10 continued