PMO reporting is not a task that should be taken lightly: sharing a common understanding of the project portfolio's health status and challenges with all stakeholders can change an organization's dynamics. The importance of project dashboards and performance indicators within organizations is well-established.
However, in project management, reporting is sometimes perceived negatively by project managers and PMOs.
Do you see it more as an effective decision-making tool or as one that serves managerial control?
If you think this common communication / information sharing tool is misunderstood, welcome aboard as we shall help you better understand its benefits, embrace PPM best practices and improve your current reporting process.
After a (always very useful) definition, this article will explain the role of data in decision-making, purposes, uses, pitfalls to avoid, PMO processes and methods, scheduling, involved parties, and stakeholders... Everything to address the major challenges related to implementing project reports and successfully managing your project portfolios.
As our favorite online encyclopedia reminds us: "A report is a document or a statement that presents information in an organized format for a specific audience and purpose"
As a typical information sharing tool, reports offer the ability to create materialized views of the data from your project portfolio. It is one of the PMO’s most frequently used monitoring tools.
Moreover, an effective PMO report drives leadership in management committees.
Keep in mind, PMO reporting aims to serve two main purposes:
Reports are important for all organizations, they allow information to be shared, identify problems and forecast into the future. Especially with the rising number of cross-functional and transformational projects!
By relying on operational performance indicators (also known as KPIs for Key Performance Indicators), it is possible to effectively measure and monitor the project’s path, or on the opposite, identify bottlenecks.
A good PMO report should help everyone quickly understand the current state of each project in the portfolio. Decision-makers, in particular, should see at a glance what decisions need to be taken. This seems obvious, but it's so easy to be overwhelmed by an overload of poorly organized data.
Above all, reporting is a decision-making tool and not a managerial control tool as often thought. It should prompt stakeholders to ask questions: "what is the next step for the project?", "what skills do we need?", "why are we behind schedule on this specific point?", "why is the delivery pace slowing down?
Here are 7 project management questions to ask yourself before starting a report.
What do I want to monitor and control?
Regardless, a project report aims for action, task planning, and decision-making. The best project reports all have one thing in common: they allow the reader to see all information at a glance so that everyone in the organization can make the right choices.
The PMO must ensure the quality of reports by making sure that the data is up-to-date, accurate and reliable.
Your reports are meant to be read.
Mapping out who the readers are is a valuable investment. There will indeed be multiple possible structures and different portfolio views.
This question also involves identifying confidentiality levels: restricted, broad, or public views.
For them, is this reporting seen as management monitoring or as a real decision-making support tool?
Were they asked after the first report if they were satisfied with the structure, the frequency and the views?
Will they be able to interact, edit or comment on the content?
Depending on your personas and readers, you will have different detail levels and frequencies. For example, here is a typical reporting content for C-level executives:
Instead of reinventing the wheel, rely on smart frameworks provided by tools with project management dashboards and templates like AirSaas.
Moreover, data is good, but context is even better. The presentation and design beyond raw data are essential. Understanding the message also involves context - adding comments, legends, etc. For example, behind the weather status change of each project, access to the detailed information should be easily available.
"All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison.” (Paracelsus, physician and alchemist).
Indeed, as opposed to excessive data-driven approaches, minimalist reporting is trending.
"Form is the substance which rises to the surface" - Victor Hugo.
Design is utterly important, both for easy data collection and for enhancing understanding.
"If it's more complicated than Instagram, we've lost!" says Simon Vacher, CPO of AirSaas. The tool must be embraced by the project manager, PMO, business units, and executives.
At AirSaas, we provide four types of report views.
This view is useful for:
Beyond a simple Gantt chart, the chronological view offers great flexibility to define the scope of your projects, adjust deadlines and customize your processes.
The portfolio Kanban can enhance visual management of projects and their various phases.
Inside the portfolio, the list view is useful for focusing on a set of items within a group.
Daily, weekly or monthly reports? There is no right or wrong answer to this question. This said, there are best practices depending on the types of projects you have in your portfolio.
For ages, PMO managers have been used to provide monthly reports in a PowerPoint format. This raises a major concern as receiving project reports every two months does not allow quick decision-making nor rapid risk mitigation.
Keep in mind that high-performing organizations now favor "on-demand" reports. For projects using critical path methods, a weekly frequency is the minimum.
As such, teams using AirSaas can send the flash report to various stakeholders once a week.
"The key is to provide relevant information and have the means to update it continuously, without waiting for a management or project committee meeting to tell us what's happening.” - Stéphan Boisson, Chief Digital & Information Officer, Digital Whirl Catalyser at SCC, AirSaas User
Since every project does not need a weekly update, here’s our advice for improved monitoring: agree with your project manager on what frequency you should update the project health status by using the update reminder option from the project page.
Prior to the development of an "ad hoc" tool, bureaucracy crept into every dashboard…
One of our clients, a CIO, mentioned that "an external PMO took 2 to 3 days per month to compile the Excel portfolio file and report the project execution status in PowerPoint, at risk of missing important decisions."
Another issue was for the reader; the tool required a whole review instead of providing a snapshot of important changes that require attention.
With AirSaas, project reporting for management is done with one click, with a progress recap, decisions to be made and risks. It takes project managers no longer than 5 minutes per week to update this information.
For the PMO creating the report as well as for the stakeholders, time is precious.
"You can only change what you can see."
As you now understand, it is important to have a cross-functional project management office (PMO) focused on the company's entire project reporting process rather than just one department.
The impact of data reports and indicators on the decision-making process is well-known. Moreover, providing contextual information (such as why is the status orange?) is a powerful mechanism to facilitate decision-making based on data.
Beyond all the best practices in report creation listed here, it is necessary to draw attention to the importance of reporting assistance to avoid errors. Using a proper reporting platform is now a "must-have" within any company.
Don't forget that effective PMO reporting drives leadership in executive committees.
While reporting is necessary for good project management, do not forget the people behind it. Reporting should not be an excuse to overlook common sense, humanity and the importance of management.
