Project Management: "Metrics That Matter"

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I have personally managed many projects and now in my consulting practice work for clients assisting them in the Creation, Buildout and Management of Project, Program and Portfolio Management Offices. In my experiences, I have been amazed at what various organizations accept as a means to determine the health of a project. I have witnessed organizations where a verbal, "We Are On Time, On Budget and There Are No Issues to Report" statement by a project manager as an acceptable status without any quantification. I have also seen the reverse where a panic is created based on a manager stating, "We Are Behind Schedule, Over Budget and There Are Major Issues!" Again, based on a verbal status update without providing the evidence to support the statement. Conversely, I have witnessed organizations rally around the Earned Value concept which is widely taught to project managers. Crunching numbers to eventually come up with the Cost Performance and Schedule Performance Metrics of a project were thought to be the "Holy Grail". However, even though project managers are responsible for the success and failure of a project, they are not always provided accurate details to factor into these calculations. So here is the dilemma. What should project health status be based on? It appears we can't rely totally on the subjective "gut feel" of the project manager and detail data to feed into scientific calculations may not be readily available. In a recent presentation that I conducted for the PMI NJ Chapter (NJ PMO Local Interest Group), I eluded to the fact that the secret can be found within project assets and extracting additional "Metrics That Matter".

Cost and Schedule
These metrics remain as important as ever with regard to knowing where the project is from a budget and time perspective. Although this is vital information, there are additional metrics that factor into the overall health of an initiative.

Project Plan Quality
How many tasks, activities or milestones are showing a past due start or finish date? How many tasks are behind schedule? How many times have dates slipped and the plan had to be re-baselined? Are %Complete updates being done and are they trending upward? When was the last time the plan was updated? Knowing this, one can determine whether the project plan is being managed effectively.

RIADs (Risks, Issues, Actions and Dependencies) - Close Rate
Do these items get effectively logged with clear understanding and actionable steps? Are due dates assigned? Is it clear who the owner is and when the follow-up will be completed? How many are being closed by their due date? How many keep getting extended and how long? Capturing these metrics will help you evaluate whether the issues of the project are getting the proper attention. Also keep in mind, if a project has too many issues, it may be a sign that it is in trouble. Too few, can be a sign that the project is not being managed properly.

Risks Identified/Planned Mitigation
Ensuring they are planned for and not just checked off as completed item on a central repository. These must have actual mitigation steps within the project plan with assigned resources, and start/end dates assigned. An effective practice is to conduct a formal review to ensure the mitigation steps will effectively resolve the risks that were identified.

Meetings/Attendance
Tracking the number of meetings scheduled and how effectively they were attended will help in determining the effectiveness of project meetings. If there are too many meetings, too few or they are not effectively covered, this could be a sign of trouble. Additionally, if these meetings are not effectively documented (formal published minutes), with key decisions, actions steps, follow-ups and clear lines of responsibility a manager will need to correct this.

Communication Consistency
Has the project manager outlined the communications plan outlining “what” communications would happen and “when”? How many communications were planned and are they being carried out? For example, if the project manager commits to having meeting minutes, risks/issues logs and updated plans distributed to the group (or providing a link to a central repository), are these happening consistently? Since a project manager's job is 90% communication, lack of measurable consistency here should be of great concern.

Decisions Requested/Received
Many times a project incurs a delay due to a key decision that needs to be made. In addition, when these decisions are made there are times that this information is forgotten, or was never communicated to the entire team. By tracking these decisions in a central repository and monitoring decisions requested, who is on the hook to deliver the answer, the the decision received and tracking time it takes will also help determine potential bottlenecks. More importantly, it will show how engaged the stakeholders are to the project. Oh yes, and do be sure to communicate this information to the teams involved.

Project Plan Monitoring
Along with watching target date slippage, I look for %Complete updates. I will trend these statistics from week to week to see if there is a consistent increase in major milestone %Complete. If the %Complete stalls for a few reporting periods or decreases, then I work more closely with that line of business to see what issues they are experiencing and how we can remove the constraints.

Change Control
The number of new requirements, how many have been approved by the Change Management Committee, how many days are added to the plan that was previously baselined and how far the critical path gets extended are key metrics to capture and track. It is also critical to consistently loop this back into the overall project communications. We don’t want to lose sight of the impact caused by decisions to allow “new” or “changed” requirements to enter the project scope.

Resource Tracking Metrics
A key part of the project planning is to have a Roles & Responsibilities Matrix. Tracking resources as they are added or re-assigned out needs to be monitored. Time must be allocated for on-boarding, task turnover and/or training. Many times the impact to project schedules caused by the changes in resources is overlooked. Illnesses, especially during flu season could create delays to the project that were not foreseen and accounted for.

I’m certain that if you look hard enough, there are quite a few more "Metrics That Matter" that will help you keep initiatives progressing in the right direction.


All the Best!


Ron Krukowski, PMP

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