Reporting

Members of the project team regularly report their progress to the project manager, who in turn reports to management and users. 

As shown in Figure 3-23, 
the project manager collects, verifies, organizes, and evaluates the information he or she receives from the team. Then the manager decides which information needs to be passed along, prepares a summary that can be understood easily, adds comments and explanations if needed, and submits it to management and users.

Project Status Meetings

Project managers, schedule regular meetings to update the team and discuss project status, issues, problems, and opportunities. Although meetings can be time consuming, most project managers believe they are worth the effort. The sessions give team members an opportunity to share information, discuss common problems, and explain new techniques. The meetings also give the project manager an opportunity to seek input and conduct brainstorming sessions.

Project Status Reports

A project is in trouble, but the project manager is reluctant to report the problems. The case highlights important ethical issues that often arise in this situation. A project manager must report regularly to his or her immediate supervisor, upper management, and users. Although a progress report might be given verbally to an immediate supervisor, reports to management and users usually are written. 

Gantt charts often are included in progress reports to show project status graphically. Deciding how to handle potential problems can be difficult. At what point should you inform management about the possibility of cost overruns, schedule delays, or technical problems? At one extreme is the overly cautious project manager who alerts management to every potential snag and slight delay. The danger here is that the manager loses credibility over a period of time, and management might ignore potentially serious situations. At the other extreme is the project manager who tries to handle all situations single-handedly and does not alert management until a problem is serious. By the time management learns of the problem, little time might remain in which to react or devise a solution.

A project manager’s best course of action lies somewhere between the two extremes, but is probably closer to the first. If you are unsure of the consequences, you should be cautious and warn management about the possibility of a problem. When you report the situation, you also should explain what you are doing to handle and monitor the problem. If you believe the situation is beyond your control, you might want to suggest possible actions that management can take to resolve the situation. Most managers recognize that problems do occur on most projects; it is better to alert management sooner rather than later.