As a project manager you must monitor and control the work of your team

Introduction

If we are not measuring our actions, whatever the action it is, how do we know that the result or performance of our action has been successful? Monitoring and control is one of the most important tasks of any project management and is the process of collecting information, recording, and reporting them concerning project performance. Performance measures by themselves do nothing. Depends on how the project manager manages those measures and put them into action it’s that makes the difference.

“What gets measured gets done”

A project can be overwhelming no matter what size. As a project manager, if you let the project carry out its own course without any supervision of the progress the result will be chaos and the project that ends achieving very little or something other than what is set up to do. To avoid this you need to ensure that there are adequate supervising performance measurements in place and that they have to be periodically improved. When talking about performance improvement, “What gets measured gets done”, attributed to Peter Drucker, Tom Peters, Edwards Deming, Lord Kelvin and others, is an old and traditional saying that has been accepted by many as true and that has gained credit through long use in practice. They acknowledged the importance of using quantitative or qualitative measures for ensuring that work is done and the results can be improved. During the project, project managers spend a significant amount of time in monitoring and controlling the activities, supervising the project’s performance and controlling it.

Monitoring and controlling process

Within the ten knowledge areas Project integration management is concern with identify and defining various activities and processes within a project and then bringing them together and coordinating them. The monitoring and controlling process group is the monitor and control project work process that interact with this knowledge area. One of the five project management process groups, the monitoring and controlling process measure progress towards achieving project goals, monitor deviation from the plan, and take corrective actions to match progress with plans and customer expectations (Schwalbe, 2012). Because project changes are inevitable it is very important to develop and strictly follow a process to monitor and control these changes and this process must be performed throughout the project’s life cycle. The PMBOK Guide - 5th Ed. defines Monitor and Control Project Work as the process of tracking, reviewing, and reporting the progress to meet the performance objectives defined in the project management plan (PMI, 2012). The key benefit of this process is that it allows stakeholders to understand the current state of the project, the steps taken, and budget, schedule, and scope forecasts (PMI, 2012). As we can see the aim of this process is to track, review and regulate the progress of a project which makes potential problems or easy to identify, to ensure a project stays on track to meet its objectives, and the key to measuring and reporting success is to focus on the main foundations of any project which is timescale, resource, quality, and scope. Monitoring and Controlling Process is used by project managers and project teams to ensure the team is making satisfactory progress towards the project goals (Weikum, 1995). The purpose is to track all major project variables including cost, time, scope, and quality of deliverables. According to Weikum the overall objectives of this process are the followings: track and review actual project accomplishment and results against project plans, revise the project plan to reflect accomplishments thus far and to revise the plan for remaining work, if needed, and provide visibility into progress as the project proceeds, so that the team and management can take corrective actions early when project performance varies significantly from original plans.