Project Foundations Series – Part 4: The Monitoring and Controlling Phase

By Wayne Rambow, Senior Program/Portfolio Delivery Consultant

As we move forward in the project lifecycle, we've already initiated the project, created a plan, and started working on its execution phase. However, to ensure a successful outcome, we must also devote equal attention to monitoring and controlling our progress. This phase is crucial in steering the project towards its intended destination by ensuring that it stays on track and overcomes any obstacles that may arise.

1. Introduction to the Monitoring and Controlling Phase

During this phase, the project activities are closely monitored and measured to ensure that they are in line with the project management plan. The main objective is to identify potential issues as early as possible and take the necessary corrective actions to keep the project on track. This phase is crucial for project managers to maintain the project's alignment with the planned objectives. Any deviations from the plan are assessed, and modifications are made to ensure the project's success.

This phase focuses on establishing and reporting meaningful Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and creating any required Change Requests if trigger thresholds of cost, schedule, or scope are identified. The thresholds of these vary from organization to organization, but a good rule of thumb is if changes to the project are significant enough to drive costs higher than 10% of the budget or schedule longer than 10% of the timeline. The primary driver of these changes is typically scope changes, however, other factors like weather, labour disruptions, regulatory change, etc. can all drive schedules longer or costs higher.

What I’m sharing with you in this article is a method of executing and controlling projects that I use. Put 1000 PMs in a room and there will be 1000 solutions and approaches. What I will share are the tools I use, and my hope is you find something useful for you in my approach. At the end of the article, I’ll share my personal email and if you email me, I’m happy to share a template dashboard with you.

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2. Key Objectives and Deliverables of the Monitoring and Controlling Phase

Performance Analysis and Reporting: Using the KPIs, metrics, and measurements outlined during the planning and execution phases, we need to periodically assess where the project stands in relation to the initial plan. In previous articles, I mention the dashboards I use for tracking performance. Here is a list of the metrics I track on every project:

• RAG Status – Standard Red/Amber/Green (RAG) for Budget, Schedule, Scope, and Overall. It is easy to add Resources and Trending to those if that is applicable to your situation.
• Budget Status – Original budget, revised budget (new number if CRs have been added), Actuals, ETC (Estimate to Complete), and EAC (Estimate at Completion). ETC is your forecast from now to the end of the project and EAC is your actuals plus ETC.
• % Complete – I have a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), a list of tasks, grouped by phase/milestone/parent task, where I enter % complete per task. Each task has an effort estimate. The overall % complete is simply the total completed effort divided by the total planned effort.
• Current Velocity – I usually work in a hybrid model that combines elements of Agile with elements of Waterfall. The reason for this is management will always ask you when it will be done and how much it will cost. I use Velocity as an “indicator” KPI. If a project has a velocity of 80+, things are going well, 50-80 means the team may be experiencing a challenge, and under 50 requires investigation. Velocity is a 4-week rolling window of performance to plan. It is a calculated pro-rated value. At the beginning of the month, velocity is the performance to plan from the prior month. For simple math, if I had 100 hours (or points) planned and completed 80, my velocity would be 80. Now, if I advance halfway through the month, velocity would be prorated by averaging 50% of last month’s velocity, with 50% of this month’s velocity. By the end of the month, velocity would essentially be my in-month velocity. This is all simplified, but I calculate this every day, on a sliding scale, with the actual workdays in a month.

• Stakeholder Communication: Continually inform stakeholders of the project's status, ensuring alignment and resetting expectations if necessary. I report in 4 quadrants; Executive Summary, Items Requiring Management Attention, Achievements from Last Period, and Planned for Next Period.
• Milestone Plan: ?Upcoming Milestones are an important part of the communication strategy. It is used to communicate key deliverables but can also identify, at a high level, potential conflicts with other initiatives. In a standard WBS or project plan, key deliverables and milestones tend to get swallowed up by the overall plan. The plan I use allows me to flag and display key elements of the project plan.

• Risk Monitoring: Regularly review the RAID log to ascertain if risks are evolving as expected and ensure that mitigation plans are effective. New risks might also emerge at this stage. When reporting, it is important to be focused. Reporting any more than 3 issues and 3 risks will have stakeholders eyes blurring.

• Other KPIs: I also report on % Complete by Milestone, Burn-Up Chart that shows Planned Hours (Points) vs Actuals by month, a RAID Summary, and a Project Budget vs. Forecast Chart.

• Maintaining the Project Plan: Driving many of the KPIs is a consistent updating of the project plan at a task level. Effort, forecast dates, % complete by task, and actual completion dates, all drive the KPIs listed above.

• Maintaining the Resource Plan: Driving the labour forecast on the Budget is an important component of budget health. If you have access to labour reporting or time-tracking tools, you want to update your resource plan based on actual hours charged to the project. I have found that the previous month(s) are the best predictors of future effort and give you the best estimations.

• Maintaining the Budget: My budget tracker is a two-tab spreadsheet. ?The first tab is a ledger where you enter forecast and actual costs as well as any Change Requests that would impact budgets.

• The second tab is the actual budget tracker. It contains the original budget, the revised budgets after change requests, a full current-year fiscal view, and a full project fiscal view.

• I then have a month-by-month view of Forecasts, Actuals, and Variances, which also show previous fiscal spending by budget category and next fiscal costs.

3. Common Challenges

• Scope Creep: For some reason, it is perceived one of the biggest challenges at this stage is handling requests or demands that weren't part of the initial project scope. This is a standard course of business for almost every project and yes it can affect many aspects of the project, but it is important we identify and manage scope actively. PMs are like news reporters at this stage, we didn’t create the news, however, our role is to actively report it.
• Resistance to Change: Depending on the type of project you are managing, change may be a significant part of delivery. A common challenge is the organization's resistance to change. If you are fortunate enough to have an OCM (Organizational Change Management) specialist available to you, I recommend engaging them early in your project for an assessment and approach recommendation.
• Data Overload: It is easy to get overwhelmed with numerous metrics and KPIs. Therefore, it is imperative to focus on the most crucial metrics that provide genuine insights. Keep it simple. While what I’ve presented above may seem very complex to manage, I have used this exact process with junior PMs and assure you it is a lot easier than it appears. The feedback at the end of the project was overwhelmingly positive as they identified this process as giving them detailed insights into every aspect of the project while keeping communications and updates as simple as possible.

4. Lessons Learned

As we progress through the Monitoring and Controlling phase of the project, it is imperative to document any insights and lessons learned. This practice not only helps in the closing phase of the current project but also proves to be invaluable for future projects. If your project is long in duration, it is advisable to conduct Lessons Learned sessions after major milestones. This approach is an excellent way to make any necessary adjustments during the monitoring phase, as well as to inform future project work.

5. Wrapping Up

During the Monitoring and Controlling phase, we act as vigilant lighthouse keepers to ensure that our project ship stays on course and avoids any unforeseen obstacles. We stay alert and analyze data to identify issues and are prepared to take corrective action to keep the project on track and achieve its objectives as planned.

?I appreciate that there are NUMEROUS approaches to controlling projects and my intention was not to go into detail on all of those, but rather highlight how I have personally had success. I've shared this approach in several organizations and I have been successful in helping others produce very sustainable delivery results. There is no right or wrong way, there is no right or wrong toolset. I will reiterate, that the only useful tool is a tool used.

As we conclude our series, Part 5 will focus on the final stage of the project lifecycle - the Closing Phase. This crucial phase ensures that all loose ends are tied up and that our projects are wrapped up in an organized manner, which sets the foundation for future endeavours. Stay tuned for more updates!

As promised, if you’d like a copy of the dashboard I’ve been using, email me at [email protected] and request it. It may not be everything you want to use, but feel free to make it your own (just don’t call for support, I have a job).

P.S. Here are the links to Part 1 – Discovery/Initiation Phase, Part 2 – The Planning Phase, and Part 3 – The Execution Phase.