Project monitoring and Control

Dr K M Salah Uddin
Professor
Department of Management Information Systems
University of Dhaka

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 Objectives
 Explain the need for monitoring & control
 SMART principles
 Devise a monitoring process for a small project
 Discuss rules for monitoring meetings
 Explain the use of earned value diagrams
 Suggest feasible control actions
 Key lesson: spot problems early & take action

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 Monitoring & Control
 Monitoring
 Checking actual and likely progress against planned
progress
 Tracking Progress to date
 Control
 Making changes to plan if necessary
 Altering the schedule
 Escalating problems / issues if necessary
 Taking action to avoid (bigger) future problems

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 Why Monitor and Control?
 If we don’t do this we have no way of knowing if we are
on schedule
 We may need to convince management that we are in
control of a project (evidence)
 We need to be able to spot problems to be able to react to
them
 As an aside this will help
 Develop human resources (project management skills)
 Preserve financial resources (by tracking costs)
 Maintain team morale (it helps if the team know where they are)
 Enhance reputation (if projects are seen to be controlled)

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 Being SMART
(Milestones or Objectives)
 Be Specific
 define what is wanted or what is going to be achieved
 Make sure it is Measurable
 So that you know when it has been met
 Make sure they are Achievable
 it should be possible (get this Agreed with the client)
 They should be Realistic
 with the resources you have (time, cost and quality)
 By what Time – agree the due-date of the milestone
 Milestones are then fixed in your project schedule, this way you can
determine if you are ahead or behind schedule.

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 Monitoring Progress
 Know what has been done
 Functionality & Quality
 Know what has been spent (the cost of effort and
other resources)
 Know How long has been taken (the duration of
time)
 What remains to be done (is a task complete)
 Time, cost and quality interact
 you cannot increase quality without increasing costs or
time used
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 Typical Problems
 Unexpected technical difficulties
 Lack of resources when needed (scheduling helps predict these)
 Quality problems (client or project team not happy with
performance)
 Changes to specifications (change control procedures can help
manage these)
 Poor monitoring hiding problems (fire-fighting rather than managing
problems)
 Unpredicted changes in costs – can lead to budgeting difficulties
 Inaccurate initial time estimates – can lead to all sorts of problems
 External changes (e.g. Government rules) – can have very major
impacts upon a project
 Interference from other projects, business priorities will need to be
determined

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 Monitoring: Reporting
 Use the Plan (schedule)
 define milestones
 Collect Information on Progress
 report current position & predict progress
 Identify Problems
 display information (charts and tables) & discuss

 Management by exception
 Give project team members responsibility for their own tasks
 Only report if there is a deviation from the schedule
 What are the Advantages & Disadvantages of this technique?

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 Monitoring: meetings
 Hold Regularly at appropriate intervals
 Discuss work in appropriate detail
 What is appropriate – depends upon project / team size
 Status of meetings is important – make sure that
they are well attended
 What will be considered?
 all work activities belonging to group
 all problems affecting group's goals

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 Meetings Need Rules
 Participants need
 authority to make commitments
 appropriate information to make decisions
 Rules: discipline and preparation
 For problems bring a solution
 reasons, impact, recovery plan, help needed
 Solve time-consuming problems elsewhere
 Encourage honesty (it is the best policy)
 Record key points & disseminate quickly
 Escalate disputes to appropriate manager to solve
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Tracking Progress
 Can be shown on Gantt charts

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 Can be done by ‘Earned Value ‘
 Each task has a value in terms of its contribution to the
overall project – measured by time or effort
 Project broken into sub-tasks etc.. To break this detail
down
 the proportion of the project (effort, or duration)
Task T1 T2 T3 T4 T5
Planned Completed by 5 14 20 28 30
Earned Value % 17 45 67 94 100

Task T1 T3 T5 T2 T4
Actual Completed by 4 8 16 28
Earned Value % 17 37 44 74 100

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 Earned Value Chart
% Complete Planned
100

80
Actual

60

40

20

4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32 36 Weeks
 About week 12, the project falls behind
 A simple technique – what disadvantages are there?
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 Control Methods
 Of Individual project team members
 informal discussions to resolve simple issues
 disciplinary action if necessary
 Training if necessary
 Of project Team
 resource re-deployment to respond to problems
 additional resources if required
 Of the Project
 alterations to schedule as a result of monitoring work
 alterations to goals if necessary
 communicating progress with team regularly

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Earned Value Terms
 Planned value (PV) – cost estimation across project
life cycle
 Earned value (EV) – real budgeted cost
 Actual cost of work performed (AC)
 Schedule performance index (SPI)
 Cost performance index (CPI)
 Budgeted cost at completion (BAC)

13-15
 Steps in Earned Value Management
1. Clearly define each activity including its resource
needs and budget

2. Create usage schedules for activities and resources

3. Develop a time-phased budget (PV)
4. Total the actual costs of doing each task (AC)

5. Calculate both the budget variance (CV) and

schedule variance (SV)
13-16
 Earned Value Milestones

ACWP
Actual

Cost Overspend
PV EV
Budget

Slip

Schedule Performed
13-17
Schedule
 Value
Earned Value Example 8=80%(10)
Activity Jan Feb Mar April Plan %C Value
Staffing 8 7 15 100 15
Blueprint 4 6 10 80 8
Prototype 2 8 10 60 6
Design 3 3 33 1
Mon Plan 8 7 6 17 38 ∑ 30
Cmltv 8 15 21 38
Mon Act 8 11 8 13 Earned Value
30=15+8+6+1
Cmltv Act 8 19 27 40
Planned Value
Actual Cost 38=15+10+10+3
40=8+11+8+13 13-18
 Earned Value Example
Schedule Variances
Planned Value (PV) = 38 = 15+10+10+3
Earned Value (EV) = 30 = 15+8+6+1
Schedule Performance Index (SPI) = EV/PV = 30/38 = .79
Estimated Time to Completion (ETC) = (1/.79)x4 = 5

Cost Variances
Actual Cost of Work Performed (AC) = 40 = 8+11+8+13
Cost Performance Index (CPI) = EV/AC = 30/40 = .75
Estimated Cost to Completion (ECC) = (1/.75)x38 = 50.7

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 Earned Value Example 2
Activity Time Budget
1 1 week 5000
2 1 week 8000
3 1 week 7000
4 1 week 12000
5 1 week 14000
6 1 week 10000
7 1 week 13000
8 1 week 11000
9 1 week 16000
10 1 week 4000
Total 100000

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 Earned Value Example 2
 After 5 weeks, it is found that activities 1-4 have
been completed and spend to this time is 36000
 Planned spend during this period:
5000+8000+7000+12000+14000=46000
 Earned value=5000+8000+7000+12000=32000
 Actual Spend: 36000
 Planned spend: 46000
 Earned value: 32000
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 Earned Value Example 2
 Cost Performance indicator=Earned value/actual
Spend=32000/36000=0.889
 Schedule Performance Indicator= Earned value/Planned Spend
 =32000/46000
 =0.696
 Estimated cost at completion=original budget/cost
performance indicator=100000/0.889=112500
 Estimated time of completion= Original time
estimates/schedule performance indicator=10
weeks/0.696=14.4 weeks

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Earned Value Example 3

 A project was planned to have cost of 200

lacs. Today it is October and work estimated
till today was worth 100 lacs. The total time
estimated for the project was 250 days. The
work which has been completed today was
budgeted for 90 lacs although 96 lacs have
been spent on the works. Determine the cost
and schedule variances and new estimated
the coat and time of complete project.
13-23
Project Termination
All activities consistent with closing out the project

 Extinction: no real afterlife

 Addition: institutionalization
 Integration to the functional organization
 Starvation: loosing the resources

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 Control
 Identify and Agree Solutions to problems
 Involves technical and political issues
 Implement the Solution
 Allocate responsibility and authority
 Check
 Ensure problem has been solved
 Learn
 Act to prevent recurrence of problem
 Modifying the processes rather than just fixing the
immediate problem

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