Project monitoring and control: Complete guide (+ checklist)

Project control and monitoring elements, including resource utilization and project progress

They say that a watched pot never boils. And that may be true, but here at Resource Guru, we say that a watched project never fails. Monitoring and controlling a project is an essential part of any successful project process. It runs alongside the execution phase and plays a key role in ensuring that your project stays on track and that your project team is fully supported. 

So come with us as we go down the rabbit hole of monitoring and controlling, and show you just how important it really is. 

What is monitoring and controlling in project management?

In a project life cycle, monitoring and controlling is the process of regularly observing and tracking the progress of your project and making any necessary proactive corrections. 

This stage is vital in ensuring your project stays on track and within budget. 

In fact, a staggering 70% of projects fail to deliver their intended outcome. But when a proper management process is put in place, this number drops drastically to a failure rate of 20% or below. 

This phase can be broken down into two stages:

  • Project monitoring 
  • Project controlling

What is project monitoring?

The project monitoring definition is pretty simple: It’s the process of regularly observing and tracking the progress of your project

This is the first step in the project monitoring and controlling phase and involves collecting data and information about various aspects of the project. Plus, it’s essential if you want to ensure project success and hit your objectives. 

Project monitoring activities can include things like: 

  • Tracking project milestones and deliverables
  • Checking the project’s performance is on track to meet goals, objectives, and KPIs, and developing performance metric reports 
  • Monitoring project manager performance metrics, so nothing falls through the cracks
  • Checking the project schedule and timeline is on track 
  • Assessing the project budget and costs compared with the forecasts 
  • Staying on top of the project scope and making sure scope creep doesn’t happen
  • Carrying out an overall quality control assessment, and conducting quality reviews (and creating reports) 
  • Watching out for any general issues that arise, and building an issue log 
  • Conducting risk assessments and producing risk management plans 
  • Setting up progress meetings and conducting status reports and reviews

The project monitoring process enables project managers and stakeholders to make sure everything is ticking along as planned. It also allows you to identify any issues, risks, and deviations from the project plan and then address them before they get out of hand.

What is project controlling?

Project controlling is the second stage of this project management phase. It’s the process of taking any action needed for issues or changes that have been identified during the monitoring stage. 

This is about putting controls in place to ensure that things don’t go further off track, but also actioning anything that needs fixing. This is compared to project monitoring which is focused on observation and evaluation.

Project controlling activities include: 

  • Analyzing the data and information that you’ve collected during the project monitoring stage
  • Assessing any changes from your original plan, and the impact of these variances on the project’s course to success 
  • Prioritizing activities according to their potential impact on your project
  • Making decisions about the best course of action to get the project back on track. This includes controlling decisions about:
    • Any changes to your plan
    • Any changes to your overall costs or budget
    • Any changes to the schedule or timeline of the project
  • Delivering any updated documentation, such as revised project schedules 
  • Informing and negotiating with key stakeholders as needed throughout the project

The overall goal of this is to make sure that your project stays on track and meets its objectives. And ultimately it helps enable you to deliver a successful project to your stakeholders.

What is the difference between monitoring and controlling in project management?

Before we move on, let’s make sure we understand the key difference between monitoring and controlling a project:

  • Monitoring is focused on observing and tracking the project’s progress. This is to ensure the project is on track and tasks are being completed on time.
  • Controlling is focused on taking any corrective measures necessary. This is to ensure that the project meets its goals and objectives.

Both monitoring and controlling are essential for ensuring the success of a project and delivering the expected outcomes within the defined constraints. And like any good pair, you can’t have one without the other.

What is the importance of monitoring and controlling in project management?

Monitoring and controlling a project is a crucial part of the project life cycle that goes hand in hand with the execution phase, where all the tasks and deliverables are being worked on. 

This means it plays a key role in making sure that your project stays on track and is successful.

Below are three benefits of the project management monitoring and controlling phase, and why it’s so important in the overall project life cycle:

1. Identifying and addressing issues 

The monitoring and control phase of a project helps you to identify and work through any hiccups that your project encounters. This stage can even help you to catch them early and solve them before they evolve into larger issues.

For example, imagine a construction project where the delivery of crucial building materials is delayed. By keeping a close eye on the progress of the project and collecting useful data and information about its performance, you can take early corrective action. In this example, it could include sourcing alternative resources or adjusting the project schedule. This helps to keep the project on track and stakeholders aligned.

2. Being able to manage and mitigate risks 

The monitoring and controlling phase also plays a key role in helping you manage project risks. It differs from the previous point of identifying issues as this is about spotting risks before they happen. 

For example, let’s take the previous example of the construction project. Managing risks could involve regularly monitoring equipment and building materials to make sure they’re all in full working order. 

By regularly monitoring the project’s performance you can identify any potential slip-ups. This allows you to then take any necessary proactive measures to help mitigate those risks. So your team can carry on working their magic to make sure your project is a success.

3. Ensuring stakeholder satisfaction 

Monitoring and controlling in project management is vital in ensuring that your stakeholders are both happy and confident with project progress.

By keeping stakeholders up-to-date and fully informed about the progress of your project and quickly addressing any issues or concerns before they develop further, you can build a better relationship with all stakeholders involved.

Monitor and control: Project work outputs

The deliverables of this phase of the project life cycle can vary depending on the scope of the project. Things such as the complexity and the specific requirements of the stakeholders also come into play, but here are some common deliverables:

  • Project status reviews and reports
  • Risk assessments and risk management plans
  • Issue logs
  • Updated documents for any changed schedules/timelines, budgets/costs, or plans 
  • People and resource utilization reports
  • Quality control reviews and reports
  • Performance metric reports
Examples of indivdual utilization rates in Resource Guru

An example of how individual utilization rates appear in Resource Guru’s software.

The monitoring and controlling process in project management: 6 steps to better projects

Follow these simple steps to help you successfully complete the monitoring and control process in project management:

Step 1: Define your monitoring and controlling activities

The first thing you’ll do is lay out the activities for this process. For example, this could be tracking project milestones and deliverables (your KPIs), checking project performance, assessing costs, and keeping everything within the planned scope.

Step 2: Collect and analyze data

The next step in the process is to collect data to compare your actual progress against your original plan. From here you can spot and analyze any differences, then put a plan of action in motion to bring you back up to speed if needed.

Step 3: Conduct progress meetings

Throughout this process, you’ll want to make sure that both you and your team are staying informed. This can be done by holding regular progress meetings where you can discuss things such as: 

  • Issues that have come up 
  • Potential risks
  • Necessary changes to your project
  • Updates to the project
  • Unexpected stakeholder requests

Step 4: Conduct risk assessments and quality reviews 

To make sure that you meet your goals, conduct regular risk assessments and quality reviews. This includes:

  • Identifying potential risks
  • Formulating a plan to eliminate or mitigate them
  • Evaluating the quality of the work being produced

Step 5: Use monitoring and control tools and techniques

There are a number of different tools and techniques that you can lean on throughout the monitoring and control phase. This is to help to track progress, assign tasks, monitor deadlines, and communicate with your team.

Step 6: Take corrective action

The final step of the project monitoring and control phase is to take corrective action for anything you’ve identified during the previous steps. This can include making changes to the project plan, budget, or schedule, or delivering updated documentation. 

All of this is with the aim of getting your project back on track, and on the path to success. 

By following these six steps, you can effectively carry out the monitoring and control phase of your project’s life cycle without (or at least with minimal) stress. 

Just remember, it’s all about keeping it simple and staying on top of things.

What are some helpful project monitoring and control techniques?

If you’re wondering how to monitor and control a project, select the relevant techniques below to help you get started.  

Earned value analysis (EVA)

Earned value analysis, or EVA for short, is a technique that can be used to compare the actual cost and progress of a project against its planned cost and progress. 

This is an accurate way of measuring whether or not your project is on track, as well as whether it’s staying within its budget and schedule.  

Milestone tracking

Creating and tracking your milestones is a common technique that is used to ensure that a project is progressing successfully. It involves identifying your key performance indicators and monitoring them regularly throughout the process. 

This helps you to make sure that your project is progressing as you originally planned, and that any issues identified can be swiftly dealt with. 

Risk management

Risk management is the process of identifying any potential risks that your project may encounter and creating a detailed plan that will help to eliminate or mitigate them. 

This technique allows you to minimize the impact of any potential risks to your project’s timeline, budget, and overall success. 

Making sure that your timeline isn’t at risk is a key area to focus on. In fact, a staggering 90% of projects finish late and 29% of projects fail due to an inaccurate time estimation. This can be prevented by accurate resource allocation and project scheduling during the planning phase

Project monitoring and control example

Consider a marketing campaign launch for the release of a major product. 

As the project manager, you would oversee the campaign’s progress and ensure its successful execution. 

During the monitoring and controlling phase, you would regularly review key performance indicators (KPIs) like website traffic, social media engagement, and sales figures. This would help you to identify any issues and make adjustments to keep everything on the straight and narrow.

Let’s say that you notice that your media isn’t generating enough engagement. You could proactively adjust the marketing strategy by putting some of your resources into paid advertisements. This could help you gain a wider audience reach. 

By continuously monitoring the project and taking corrective action, you increase the campaign’s chances of success.

What are some helpful project monitoring and control tools?

Gantt charts

A Gantt chart is a tool that gives you a visual representation of a number of different areas of your project. This can include things such as the schedule, the tasks, and any deviations from your original plan. 

Resource management software

Resource management, allocation, and capacity planning play an important role in making sure your project always has hands on deck throughout its life cycle.

You need to: 

Resource planning apps like Resource Guru give you a clear view of your project team’s availability and allow you to avoid overbooking or underbooking your team.

By utilizing Resource Guru’s project forecasting reports, you’ll always have an eye on the pulse of the project.

approvals reports tooltip

A view of the resource reporting section in Resource Guru.

Project management software

Project management software is used for a multitude of things during a project’s life cycle. It can be used to track progress, assign tasks, monitor your deadlines, and make sure the project scheduling is consistent with your resource allocation and capacity strategy. 

This helps you to keep all of your processes in one place and ensures a smoother journey for you and your team.

Your project monitoring and control checklist

Here’s a handy checklist, to make sure you’ve ticked all the right boxes when you’re developing your project monitoring and control plan: 

In the monitoring stage, make sure to collect data and information on your:

  • Schedule
  • Budget
  • Scope
  • Quality control
  • Risks

Monitoring activities include:

  • Tracking milestones and deliverables
  • Keeping an eye on resource allocation and utilization
  • Checking if you’re on track to meet goals, objectives, and KPIs, and developing performance metric reports
  • Checking the schedule and timeline is on track
  • Assessing the actual budget and costs compared with the forecasts
  • Making sure everything is still within the original scope
  • Carrying out an overall quality control assessment and conducting quality reviews and creating reports
  • Watching out for any general issues that arise, and building an issue log
  • Conducting risk assessments, and producing risk management plans
  • Setting up progress meetings and conducting status reports and reviews

In the project controlling stage, make sure to:

  • Analyze all the data and information that you’ve collected during the project monitoring stage
  • Assess any variances from your original plan, and the impact of these variances on the project’s course to success
  • Prioritize activities according to their potential impact on the project
  • Make decisions about the best course of action to get the project back on track
  • Deliver any updated documentation

Common deliverables for this phase are:

  • Status reviews and reports
  • Risk assessments and risk management plans
  • Issue logs
  • Updated documents for any changed schedules/timelines, budgets/costs, or plans
  • Quality control reviews and reports
  • Performance metric reports

Follow the six steps of the monitoring and control phase:

  • Define your monitoring and controlling activities
  • Collect and analyze data
  • Conduct progress meetings
  • Conduct risk assessments and quality reviews 
  • Use monitoring and control tools and techniques
  • Take corrective action

Make use of project monitoring techniques like:

  • Earned value analysis (EVA)
  • Milestone tracking
  • Risk management

Utilize project monitoring software:  

Take full control of your project 

Project monitoring and controlling is a vital stage of any project’s life cycle. 

But we’ll be honest—it can be a tricky one to wrap your head around. Much of the confusion is due to it running alongside the project execution phase with a fair bit of overlap. 

But without this stage, you increase the risk of your project falling behind. In fact, formal project management approaches such as project monitoring and control have been found to result in the successful completion of projects 73% of the time.

With proper monitoring and control, and with the right project monitoring tools by your side, you can ensure your project stays on track and gets to the finish line in one piece.

Next up, and last but not least, project closure

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