Can we remove the pain points of project status reports?

Why are project status reports often pain points? Can we eliminate the project status report? Many project managers do not like reporting and consider it a waste of time. So, can we eliminate this annoyance? That is what we will discuss in today’s article. This is the first article in our series on:

A customer problem and how we solve it via the UrukPlatform.

The Uruk Platform Background

As we build the Uruk Platform, we reflect on decades of experience on real projects worldwide and in different industries. These projects ranged from micro to mega, simple to incredibly complex. During these decades, we have learned from the good, bad, and even ugly practices. One day, we will share many of these stories.

The Customer Problem

One area we observed as a weakness in the project management practice is the annoyance of project status reports, reporting, and performance management. Further, it can be an issue for those on the owner’s side. For example, some project owner organizations wait for contractors’ reports to do their internal ones.

Delayed Reports

• These were often monthly reports
• Issued about ten days after the month was over
• Then, after a few more days on the owner’s side, we end up with reports about 15 days out of date.

Significant Effort

A related problem is that the person responsible for reporting must talk with the team leads to collect progress information and learn about potential issues, changes, or risks. Without a robust and automated progress and reporting system, the collected data will be subjective and biased rather than credible and quantitative.

So, the problem is now delayed reporting, much effort, and suspect data.

Questionable Forecasting

Then, the chain of problems leads to one more. How can we forecast accurately?

A must in project management is timely and accurate forecasts, especially on capital projects. The above practice is neither timely nor accurate (often).

Solving the Problem

How are we solving this problem in the UrukPlatform?

The three images we share share – are samples of what will be in the Uruk Platform – and all are automatically generated. The Beta version, which we will release in mid-May 2024, will have more than 50 performance charts!

We have many features to counter this problem, and we will briefly share them here:

1. Automation: The Uruk Platform is a digital solution. Therefore, every step and action will automatically update relevant performance and status.

2. Synchronization (within a project): The Uruk Platform includes managing projects, programs, and supporting actions (scope, cost, change, etc.). Therefore, whenever we add a change, identify a risk, raise an issue, or capture a lesson learned, the information is automatically synced to provide real-time accurate and timely performance.

3. Synchronization (with program and portfolio): The Uruk Platforms covers the 4PMs. So, if a project is part of the program, any update within the project (previous point) will automatically update the program information. Further, any update on any project or program will automatically update the portfolio performance.

In other words, all the steps are within the Uruk Platform. The performance update is automated and synced transparently and in real time. There is no need to chase people only to collect questionable information.

Closing Comments

As you can see from these articles, we are not business/tech people building software. We are project management practitioners with decades of global experience. It was natural for us to build the Uruk Platform using our learned history!

Remember:

Success can be predetermined, cultivated, and achieved!

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