One of the key requirements for any project, including capital construction projects, is the time distribution of performance and status reports to their intended recipients. The project communication plan is used to identify those reports and all related information. This plan is one of the management plans that need to be prepared along with the project management plan. On capital construction projects, there could be more than one hundred reports that need to be shared with different project stakeholders that could be located in different parts of the world.
To ensure successful compliance with the project communication plan, there are a number of requirements. The first requirement is to ensure that the data needed for those reports are captured in a trustworthy real-time format to ensure the validity and correctness of the communicated information. The second requirement is to ensure that there is a single data repository for storing all captured project data. Some of the reports to be shared could require combining and consolidating the data captured from different project management processes. The third requirement is to be able to produce the reports in any desired form and format. Reports that are generated on construction projects could include the tabular and graphical presentation of the captured data as well as might require to filter, group, and sort the data in different forms and format. Another requirement is to be the ability to disseminate those reports on the set dates to their recipients as defined in the project’s communication plan.Project Management Information System (PMIS) solutions like PMWeb provides a solution to fulfill those requirements using a 100% web-enabled platform. PMWeb allows automating all project management processes to ensure that the data included in those processes are captured in a real-time trust worthy format and are stored on a single database. This will ensure that the first two requirements for capturing real-time, trust-worthy data for all project management processes is achieved.
PMWeb comes ready with most of the project management processes needed for capital construction projects as well as it allows creating other project management processes using PMWeb custom form builder. For each input form needed for those project management processes, a workflow will be assigned to ensure that the tasks for submitting, reviewing, and approving are executed in accordance with the project management plan.For example, the project communication plan is an example of an input form that is created using PMWeb custom form builder. The form will be used to list all reports that need to be communicated to the project stakeholders. For each report, the communication plan will also detail the method for communicating the report as well as the frequency for communicating the report.
Similar to other project management input forms, a workflow can be assigned to the project communication plan to map the tasks for submitting, reviewing, and approving the communication plan. Similar to what is expected in a workflow, durations can be assigned to each task along with the responsibility for performing the task. The approval authority levels can also be added to the workflow can be added when needed.
The next step will be to use the PMWeb report writer to create the reports and dashboards that need to be communicated to the project stakeholders. Those could be reports that might display information from a single project management process like Issues Resolution, for example, or a report that will share information on different interrelated processes like the cost management report or even a report that displays the weekly or monthly status of the project performance. Although PMWeb comes ready with more than 150 reports and dashboards, organizations can also create their own reports and dashboards in the desired form and format.
For each report created in PMWeb, the project team can specify how the report will be communicated to the project stakeholders whether they have access to PMWeb or not. The frequency for communicating each report can be daily, weekly or monthly.
For example, if the option of weekly frequency was selected, then PMWeb also allows setting the day of the week on when the report will be sent. In addition, PMWeb allows setting the period from issuing the scheduled reports by setting the form and to dates. Also, PMWeb also allows defining the file format for the created report, which could be PDF, CSV, Excel, Word, TIFF, XML, and MHTML. The next step would be the select the project stakeholders who will receive the reports. Those could be either PMWeb users, non-PMWeb users but defined as contacts in the companies directory and non-PMWeb users and not defined in the companies directory.
Project stakeholders will automatically receive the PMWeb reports that had been scheduled for them via email. Most project stakeholders would usually require those reports to be sent in PDF file format as this will enable them to view them by only having the PDF viewer. They can also add notes and comments to those PDF files when needed. Nevertheless, what is more, important when the file is sent in a PDF file format, is that the content of the report or dashboard will remain intact.
