1 Project Control Kathy S. Schwaig

2 What is Project Control? Project control is the continuous monitoring of the project for deviations from plan (time, cost,or quality) and the execution of corrective action Project Control involves: Finding and solving problems Updating the plan Tracking actual resource usage and costs Project control requires a comprehensive and credible (i.e., realistic and up-to-date) plan

3 Two Project Control Approaches Continuously and immediately correct all deviations from plan Periodically re-plan remainder of project Which is the better approach?

4 Some Basic Principles of Effective Project Control Completion orientation Near term commitment Preservation of slack Mutual accountability

5 Project Control Meetings Frequency of meetings depends on project duration, complexity, and uncertainty Provides a forum for activity mangers to report activity status information (actual start date, along with either actual finish date, remaining duration, or estimated finish date) Communication is key Problems need to be put on the table for discussion----problems need to be identified and diagnosed Discussion/evaluation of courses and action

6 Outcome of Project Control Meetings Select/commit to specific action Analyze impact on project quality/schedule/budget/resource plan Revise selected course of action as required Reconfirm individual responsibilities (who is going to do what) Project manager prepares updated project plan and report

7 Measures of Activity Progress Actual start and finish dates Estimated remaining duration Estimated completion date Percent complete Which one would you choose?

8 Traffic Light Reporting Team members are asked to estimate the likelihood of meeting the planned target date One traffic light reporting scheme: Green signifies “on target” Yellow signifies “not on target but recoverable” Red signifies “not on target and recoverable only with difficulty” Traffic light reporting highlights only the risk of non-achievement; it is not an attempt to estimate work done or to quantify expected delays

9 Monitoring and Controlling Project Costs Cost monitoring is one aspect of project control Not only is it important to control project costs Costs provide an indication of the effort that has gone into (or at least been charged to ) a project A project might be on schedule but only because more money has been spent on activities than originally budgeted A cumulative expenditure chart provides a simple way to compare actual vs. planned expenditure

10 Limitations of Looking at Project Costs By themselves, project costs tell us little about project status Cost charts become much more useful if we add projected future costs Calculated by adding the estimated costs of uncompleted work to the costs already incurred

11 Earned Value Analysis EVA, or budgeted cost of work performed, has become more popular in recent years and represents a refinement of cost monitoring EVA is based on assigning a value to each task or work package based on the original expenditure forecasts The assigned value is the original budgeted cost for the item and is known as the baseline budget or budgeted cost of work scheduled (BCWS)

12 Earned Value Analysis A task that has not yet started is assigned the value of zero When a task is completed, the project is credited with the value of the task The total value credited to the project at any point is known as the earned value of budgeted cost of work performed (BCWP) BCWP can be represented as a value or as a percentage of the budgeted cost of work scheduled (BCWS)

13 Earned Value Analysis: Assigning Values to Tasks Where tasks have been started but are not yet complete, some consistent method of assigning an earned value must be applied The most conservative approach is to assign a value of zero until a task is completed, at which point it is assigned 100% of the budgeted value.