Status Your Project with the WBS

The WBS serves as a perfect framework for project status reporting

Your WBS is the list of everything that needs to get done to complete the project.  It’s a ready-made framework for monitoring and statusing the project.

Let’s begin with the basic structure of the WBS:

WBS Code	WBS Description
100	Project Management
200	Product
200.1	Product Requirements
200.1.1	Stakeholder Requirements
200.1.2	System Requirements
200.2	Product Design
200.3	Product Build
200.4	Product Testing
200.5	Product Deployment

If we are going to use this for reporting, we need to include who’s in charge of delivering each WBS Item.  Generally, this can be the Project Manager for that piece of work.

WBS Code	WBS Description	Responsible
100	Project Management	PM
200	Product	n/a
200.1	Product Requirements	n/a
200.1.1	Stakeholder Requirements	Bill F
200.1.2	System Requirements	Jane T
200.2	Product Design	John X
200.3	Product Build	Mary G
200.4	Product Testing	Keith D
200.5	Product Deployment	Sara S

The updated table above shows which manager or lead has responsibility for delivering the work described in each WBS entry.  The items 200 – Product, and 200.1 Product Requirements have no designated responsible person because all the work under them are parcelled out to the work subitems under them.

Now we need to update the table to show the status.

WBS Code	WBS Description	Responsible	Status
100	Project Management	PM	n/a
200	Product	n/a	Started
200.1	Product Requirements	n/a	Started
200.1.1	Stakeholder Requirements	Bill F	Completed
200.1.2	System Requirements	Jane T	70%
200.2	Product Design	John X	NYS
200.3	Product Build	Mary G	NYS
200.4	Product Testing	Keith D	10%
200.5	Product Deployment	Sara S	NYS

In the above update, we see that item 200.1.1 has been completed, 200.1.2 is 70% completed, some of the work are Not Yet Started.  Work 100 – Project Management will have no status because it is ongoing work, while 200 and 200.1 will have only Started at their level. They will become Completed when all the sub-items under them have been completed.

The problem with the above is that it says nothing about whether the project is going according to schedule, going ahead, or being delayed.

For that we can use Earned Values to show the status of the work.

And because the status date of each individual work item may differ, it might be useful to add another column to indicate the as-of status date for that piece of work.

The Project Manager as Disciplinarian

If your project does not have a strong a central organising individual, it will flounder, atrophy, and then collapse.

A project is a collection of talented individuals from many disciplines, individuals with their own agendas and their own visions and their own priorities. This collection falls down into disorganisation without someone providing the structure for the group to act.

Hence it is critical that the project manager be a disciplinarian.  I mean that in the sense that he or she imposes discipline to the group. 

The PM acts as the catalyst that energises the group.  The PM articulates the single vision of the project, makes everyone turn their heads toward that vision, and makes them march together toward that vision.

The PM must be forceful, not necessarily in the sense of overbearing or overpowering but in the sense of being the force that pushes the project forward day by day, prevailing over forces that will tend to rend the group apart into many directions, and keeps it – herds it - aimed in the right direction.