Project Control Process

Control is the process of comparing actual performance against plan

to identify deviations, evaluate possible alternative courses of actions, and
take appropriate corrective action. The steps in the project control process
for measuring and evaluating project performance are listed below:

 Setting a baseline plan.

 Measuring the actual performance
 Comparing actual with baseline
plans.  Taking corrective action.

Step 1: Setting a Baseline Plan

The baseline plan provides with the elements for measuring

performance. The baseline is derived from the cost estimates; information

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relating to duration is derived from the work breakdown structure (WBS)
database; and time-sequence data are derived from the network and resource
scheduling decisions. The WBS defines the work in discrete work packages
that are tied to deliverables and organization units. In addition, each work
package defines the work, duration, and budget. From the WBS, the project
network schedule is used to phase all work, resources, and budgets into a
baseline plan.

Step 2: Measuring the Actual Performance

Time and budgets are quantitative measures of performance that

readily fit into the integrated information system. Qualitative measures such
as meeting customer technical specifications and product function are most
frequently determined by on-site inspection or actual use. Measurement of
time performance is relatively easy and obvious. Examples: the critical path,
early on schedule or late; is the slack of near critical-paths decreasing to
cause new critical activities, etc. For measuring performance, earned value
is necessary to provide a realistic estimate of performance against a time-
phased budget. Earned value will be defined as the budgeted cost of the
work performed (EV).

Step 3: Comparing Actual with Baseline Plan

All the baseline plans seldom materialize as expected and hence, it

becomes imperative to measure deviations from plan to determine if action
is necessary. Periodic monitoring and measuring the status of the project
allow for comparisons of actual versus expected plans. It is crucial that the
timing of status report be frequent enough to allow for early detection of
variations from plan and early detection of causes. Usually, status reports
should take place every one to four weeks to be useful and allow for
proactive correction.

Step 4: Taking Corrective Action

If deviations from plans are significant, corrective actions will be

needed to bring the project back in line with original or revised plan. In
some cases, conditions or scope can change, which, in turn, will require a
change in the baseline plan to recognize new information.

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Key Programme/Project Monitors, Controls and Reports

Following are the various types of project controls and reports:

a) Business Case: The Business Case effectively describes what is the

value of project outcome to the sponsoring organization. Managing
the Business Case is about value management of benefits, costs,
timescales and risks.
b) Project Plan: A comprehensive plan which clearly defines the
products to be produced, resources and time needed for all activities,
any dependencies between activities and points at which progress
will be monitored and controlled with any agreed tolerances.
c) Project Initiation Document (PID): This document defines all
major aspects of the project and forms the basis for its management
and the assessment of overall success. There are two primary uses of
the document:
 To ensure that the project has a complete and sound basis
before there is any major commitment to the project
 To act as a base document against which the project can
assess progress, change management issues, and ongoing
viability questions.

For construction projects, the content of the Project Initiation

Document is set out in the Project Execution Plan.

d) Stage Plan: Provides detail of how and when the objectives for the
stage are to be met by showing the deliverables, activities and
resources required. The Stage Plan provides a baseline against which
stage progress will be measured and is used as the basis of
management control throughout the stage.
e) Work Package: Sets out all information needed to deliver one or
more specialist products. The necessary information is collated by
the Project Manager and used to formally pass responsibility for
work or delivery to a team leader or member.
f) Change Control Strategy: The Strategy documents the procedure to
ensure that the processing of all Project Issues is controlled,
including the submission, analysis and decision making.

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g) Highlight Reports: The highlight reports are used to provide the
Project Board (and possibly other stakeholders) with a summary of
the stage status at intervals defined by them and to monitor stage and
project progress. The Project Manager also uses it to advise the
Project Board of any potential problems or areas where the Project
Board could help.

h) Checkpoint Report: From the Team Manager to the Project

Manager at a frequency defined in the stage plan and/or work
package detailing the status of work for each member of a team.

i) Project Issue Log: A project issue is a generic term for any mat-ter
that has to be brought to the attention of the Project Team and
requires an answer. An issue can have a negative or positive impact
on the project and includes items such as requests for change, off-
specifications (this is an item not included in the original specifica-
tion or errors or omissions found in work already completed which
would result in the agreed specification or acceptance criteria not
being met), questions and statements of concern.

j) Risk Management Log: Risks can be threats to the successful

delivery of the Project. Usually they are recorded in a risk register
which is used to manage the project’s exposure to risk that is the
probability of specific risks occurring and the potential impact if they
did.

k) End Stage Report: It Summarizes progress to date and provides an

overview of the project as a whole, including impact of the stage on
the project plan, the business case and identified risks. The project
board uses the information to decide what action to take with the
project; approve the next stage; ask for revised plans, amend the
project scope or stop the project.

l) End Project Report: A report sent from the Project Manager to the
Project Board, which confirms the hand-over of all deliverables,
provides an updated business case, and an assessment of how well
the project has done against its Project Initiation Document.

m) Lessons Learned Report: A report which describes the lessons

learned in undertaking a project and which includes statistics from
the quality control of the project’s management products. It is

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approved by the Project Board then held centrally for the benefit of
future projects. If the project is one of a number attached to a
programme this document will also be used as input to the
programme review.

n) Post Project Review: Documents whether business benefits have

been realized and recommendations for future improvements have
been recorded. This is viewed as part of the project evaluation review
which includes the End Project Report and Lessons Learned Report.

Project Control Issues

a) Monitoring Time Performance

A major goal of progress reporting is to catch any negative variances

from plan as early as possible to determine if corrective action is necessary.
Fortunately, monitoring schedule performance is relatively easy. The project
network schedule, derived from the WBS/OBS, serves as the baseline to
compare against actual performance. Gantt charts (bar charts) and control
charts are the typical tools used for communicating project schedule status.

Gantt Charts

Gantt and control charts serve well as a means for tracking and
trending schedule performance. Their easy-to-understand visual formats
make them favorite tools for communicating project schedule status-
especially to top management who do not usually have time for details.
Adding actual and revised time estimates to the Gantt chart gives a quick
overview of project status on the report date. The following figure shows
the sample of multi-color Gantt chart.

Control Charts

Control chart is another tool used to monitor past project schedule

performance and current performance and to estimate future schedule
trends. Control charts are also frequently used to monitor progress toward
milestones, which mark events and as such have zero duration. The
following figure shows the sample control chart.

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Notes

b) Need for an Integrated Information System

There are many customized monitoring and control systems used in

practice. The disparity among monitoring systems is usually found in the lack
of connections with a time-phased baseline plan. Such systems fail to compare
actual work completed for any time period against budgeted scheduled costs
for the same time period. Without matching time-phased budgets to actual cost
of work completed, it is impossible to reliably measure cost performance.