Continuous Project & Risk Monitoring
In all projects, difficulties and risks will evolve relatively slowly and mostly undiscovered. One of the causes of a possible project failure is the current way to track and audit projects at certain milestones only.

Our Continuous Project & Risk Monitoring (CPRM) approach eliminates this typical risk for a project. It implements an early warning system for project risks and difficulties.
The CPRM product consists of several pieces that are complementary to each other.
  • The first grade is the regular monitoring of steering committee sessions where a comprehensive report to the owner of the project is included. In these sessions, we act as neutral observer. Our emphasis is on timely decisions, on the detection and resolution of conflicts, and on the overall objectives of the project. By doing this we offer a truthful second opinion.
     
  • As a next level, we start anonymous and non - anonymous surveys with all participants of the project. The surveys are carried out electronically and cover most aspects related to the project. It also includes questionnaires for people who may be affected by the project’s result later on. We recommend performing the surveys on a regular base, i.e. monthly. A full report is given to the project manager as well as to the project owner. We present the results of the surveys in the steering committee.
     
  • Third, we offer to systematically gather all effort made by the project. Most projects just report singular efforts, i.e. for external companies, and do not even know what the real expenditure is. After an initial effort registration, we gather, on a weekly base, hours and expenses electronically. A report is then available to the project’s manager and a management summary will be presented to the steering committee.
     
  • The fourth step is a systematic project and risk monitoring. It starts with a review of the project master plan. If not already established we also offer the creation of such a plan. With the reviewed plan as a base, we continue with a weekly electronic task and resource tracking. We continuously update the plan, give projections for the next reporting period and identify the related risks. The results out of this monitoring will be presented to the steering committee.
     
  • As a fifth piece in our Continuous Project and Risk Monitoring product, we will manage the project office. This includes all activities written before plus additional management and controlling efforts. Practically speaking we are with at least two persons permanently present in your project.
     
  • To complete the spectrum of the product, as the sixth step we are also able to take the responsibility for the project as interim project managers. This job will be done, if
     
    • Your current project manager don’t fit the job
    • You need your current project manager on another important project
    • You need an outside project management
    • The assigned project manager is yet not available.
    Nevertheless, we will manage the project under certain circumstances for a predefined period of time.
 

Implementation of Surveys

On a regular basis i.e. weekly, an email with a structured questionnaire is send as a survey to all participants of a project. The email consists of a HTML form with questions about the current state of the project.
The participants answer the questions within the email client and report them directly to our survey server. This is done by pressing the submit button of the form. No email is send, so privacy is guaranteed. Our database mechanism collects the submitted answers and generates a detailed report. The result of the actual survey is available to all participants.
We will comment the survey for the management level by highlighting the projects progress and addressing possible risks.

What is the advantage of a survey ? First, classic audits usually take a reasonable time for preparation and realization. This effort amounts to at least six person days for all involved parties. Continuous Project & Risk Monitoring reduces this effort to a maximum of 5 minutes per person and week. Secondly, project managers tend to hold back information about risks and difficulties until they are evident. Continuous Project & Risk Monitoring asks all project members and detects difficulties before they get precarious.

 
* Continuous Project & Risk Monitoring was jointly developed with netbusiness.com, Inc.