Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports
- Your organization has introduced project portfolio management (PPM) processes that require new levels of visibility into the project portfolio that were not required before.
- Key PPM decision makers are requesting new or improved dashboards and reports to help support making difficult decisions.
- Often PPM dashboards and reports provide too much information and are difficult to navigate, resulting in information overload and end-user disengagement.
- PPM dashboards and reports are laborious to maintain; ineffective dashboards end up wasting scarce resources, delay decisions, and negatively impact the perceived value of the PMO.
Our Advice
Critical Insight
- Well-designed dashboards and reports help actively engage stakeholders in effective management of the project portfolio by communicating information and providing support to key PPM decision makers. This tends to improve PPM performance, making resource investments into reporting worthwhile.
- Observations and insights gleaned from behavioral studies and cognitive sciences (largely ignored in PPM literature) can help PMOs design dashboards and reports that avoid information overload and that provide targeted decision support to key PPM decision makers.
Impact and Result
- Enhance your PPM dashboards and reports by carrying out a carefully designed enhancement project. Start by clarifying the purpose of PPM dashboards and reports. Establish a focused understanding of PPM decision-support needs, and design dashboards and reports to address these in a targeted way.
- Conduct a thorough review of all existing dashboards and reports, evaluating the need, effort, usage, and satisfaction of each report to eliminate any unnecessary or ineffective dashboards and design improved dashboards and reports that will address these gaps.
- Design effective and targeted dashboards and reports to improve the engagement of senior leaders in PPM and help improve PPM performance.
Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports Research & Tools
Start here – read the Executive Brief
Read our concise Executive Brief to find out why you should enhance your PPM reports and dashboards, review Info-Tech’s methodology, and understand the four ways we can support you in completing this project.Besides the small introduction, subscribers and consulting clients within this management domain have access to:
- Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports – Phases 1-3
1. Establish a PPM dashboard and reporting enhancement project plan
Identify gaps, establish a list of dashboards and reports to enhance, and set out a roadmap for your dashboard and reporting enhancement project.
- Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports – Phase 1: Establish a PPM Dashboard and Reporting Enhancement Project Plan
- PPM Decision Support Review Workbook
- PPM Dashboard and Reporting Audit Workbook
- PPM Dashboard and Reporting Audit Worksheets – Exisiting
- PPM Dashboard and Reporting Audit Worksheets – Proposed
- PPM Metrics Menu
- PPM Dashboard and Report Enhancement Project Charter Template
2. Design and build enhanced PPM dashboards and reporting
Gain an understanding of how to design effective dashboards and reports.
- Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports – Phase 2: Design and Build New or Improved PPM Dashboards and Reporting
- PPM Dashboard and Report Requirements Workbook
- PPM Executive Dashboard Template
- PPM Dashboard and Report Visuals Template
- PPM Capacity Dashboard Operating Manual
3. Implement and maintain effective PPM dashboards and reporting
Officially close and evaluate the PPM dashboard and reporting enhancement project and transition to an ongoing and sustainable PPM dashboard and reporting program.
- Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports – Phase 3: Implement and Maintain Effective PPM Dashboards and Reporting
- PPM Dashboard and Reporting Program Manual
Workshop: Enhance PPM Dashboards and Reports
Workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn't enough, we offer low-cost delivery of our project workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a roadmap in place to complete your project successfully.
1 Establish a PPM Dashboard and Reporting Enhancement
The Purpose
PPM dashboards and reports will only be effective and valuable if they are designed to meet your organization’s specific needs and priorities.
Conduct a decision-support review and a thorough dashboard and report audit to identify the gaps your project will address.
Take advantage of the planning stage to secure sponsor and stakeholder buy-in.
Key Benefits Achieved
Current-state assessment of satisfaction with PPM decision-making support.
Current-state assessment of all existing dashboards and reports: effort, usage, and satisfaction.
A shortlist of dashboards and reports to improve that is informed by actual needs and priorities.
A shortlist of dashboards and reports to create that is informed by actual needs and priorities.
The foundation for a purposeful and focused PPM dashboard and reporting program that is sustainable in the long term.
Activities
1.1 Engage in PPM decision-making review.
1.2 Perform a PPM dashboard and reporting audit and gap analysis.
1.3 Identify dashboards and/or reports needed.
1.4 Plan the PPM dashboard and reporting project.
Outputs
PPM Decision-Making Review
PPM Dashboard and Reporting Audit
Prioritized list of dashboards and reports to be improved and created
Roadmap for the PPM dashboard and reporting project
2 Design New or Improved PPM Dashboards and Reporting
The Purpose
Once the purpose of each PPM dashboard and report has been identified (based on needs and priorities) it is important to establish what exactly will be required to produce the desired outputs.
Gathering stakeholder and technical requirements will ensure that the proposed and finalized designs are realistic and sustainable in the long term.
Key Benefits Achieved
Dashboard and report designs that are informed by a thorough analysis of stakeholder and technical requirements.
Dashboard and report designs that are realistically sustainable in the long term.
Activities
2.1 Review the best practices and science behind effective dashboards and reporting.
2.2 Gather stakeholder requirements.
2.3 Gather technical requirements.
2.4 Build wireframe options for each dashboard or report.
2.5 Review options: requirements, feasibility, and usability.
2.6 Finalize initial designs.
2.7 Design and record the input, production, and consumption workflows and processes.
Outputs
List of stakeholder requirements for dashboards and reports
Wireframe design options
Record of the assessment of each wireframe design: requirements, feasibility, and usability
A set of finalized initial designs for dashboards and reports.
Process workflows for each initial design
3 Plan to Roll Out Enhanced PPM Dashboards and Reports
The Purpose
Ensure that enhanced dashboards and reports are actually adopted in the long term by carefully planning their roll-out to inputters, producers, and consumers.
Plan to train all stakeholders, including report consumers, to ensure that the reports generate the decision support and PPM value they were designed to.
Key Benefits Achieved
An informed, focused, and scheduled plan for rolling out dashboards and reports and for training the various stakeholders involved.
Activities
3.1 Plan for external resourcing (if necessary): vendors, consultants, contractors, etc.
3.2 Conduct impact analysis: risks and opportunities.
3.3 Create an implementation and training plan.
3.4 Determine PPM dashboard and reporting project success metrics.
Outputs
External resourcing plan
Impact analysis and risk mitigation plan
Record of the PPM dashboard and reporting project success metrics