What are the best practices for creating and updating project status reports in Excel?

1 Choose a suitable template

Choosing a template for your project is the first step to take. You can use a pre-made template from Excel or online sources, or create one yourself. A good template should include the project name, manager, and date; key milestones, deliverables, and deadlines; summary of progress, achievements, and challenges; status indicators like green, yellow, or red; action items with owners and due dates; risks, issues, and dependencies; and comments and feedback.

2 Update regularly and accurately

The second step is to update your project status reports regularly and accurately. Establish a frequency and schedule for updating your reports, such as weekly, biweekly, or monthly. Make sure the information you provide is accurate, up-to-date, and verifiable. To do this, collect data and feedback from team members, clients, and other stakeholders. Review and analyze the data to identify trends, issues, and risks. Then adjust your plans, priorities, and expectations accordingly. Highlight the changes, achievements, and challenges since the last report. Finally, communicate your updates clearly and concisely.

3 Use formulas and functions

The third step in creating project status reports in Excel is to use formulas and functions to automate and simplify them. Formulas and functions can be used to calculate the percentage of completion, variance, or deviation of your tasks, milestones, or deliverables. Additionally, they can be used to summarize the status, progress, or performance of your project or subprojects. Moreover, you can use them to display data in charts, graphs, or tables to visualize trends, comparisons, or relationships. Furthermore, you can apply conditional formatting to highlight data based on criteria such as status, priority, or risk level.

4 Customize and format

In the fourth step of creating project status reports in Excel, you can customize and format them to suit your preferences, style, and audience. You can change the layout, colors, fonts, or themes of your report, add logos, images, icons, or symbols to enhance it, and use headers, footers, titles, or subtitles to organize the data. Filters, slicers, or pivot tables can be used to sort, filter, or group data. Moreover, comments, notes, or hyperlinks can be added to provide additional information or references.

5 Share and collaborate

The fifth step is to share and collaborate on your project status reports in Excel with your team members, clients, and other stakeholders. Doing so can help you get feedback, input, and approval from project parties, as well as keep everyone informed, aligned, and engaged. To share and collaborate on your reports, you can save them in a cloud-based platform like OneDrive or SharePoint; send them as attachments or links via email or other communication tools; use the share, co-author, or comment features in Excel to invite others to view or edit your reports; or use the protect, password, or track changes features in Excel to control access or changes to your reports.

6 Review and improve

The sixth step is to review and improve your project status reports in Excel based on the feedback, results, and lessons learned from your project. This can help you to identify what worked well, what didn't work well, and what can be done better in the future, as well as enhance your skills in creating and updating project status reports. To review and improve your reports, ask for feedback from team members, clients, and other stakeholders. Evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency, and quality of your reports. Identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of your reports. Implement changes or best practices for your reports. And document the lessons learned, tips, or recommendations for your reports.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?