E01 – Measure and report performance

This is a draft of the manual for review. If you have any comments, please email them to info@omimo.org. Please check back for the final version.

What

Evaluate how much closer you’ve come to achieving all the expected outcomes and what it takes to enable and sustain the remaining outcomes.

Based on the data, prepare one or more types of reports for the sponsor and other stakeholders.

Why

There are two concerns that should be addressed here. First, you must confirm that the program is still viable and you can be reasonably certain that you can achieve the expected results. Second, you have to forecast the time and money needed to enable and sustain the remaining outcomes, because there’s a limit to the investment the stakeholder will accept for the outcomes.

Reporting is key: Most stakeholders are more supportive when they are kept informed. Furthermore, there may be conflicts or overlooked opportunities, and timely reporting to stakeholders may help you identify those.

Who

The program manager is responsible for measuring and reporting the performance of the program. The measurement is based on the performance information provided by the project managers, and the program manager should ensure that the information is reliable.

How

First, the program manager receives the performance measurements of all projects from their managers. If projects don’t have a frequent measurement and reporting activity, it should be added to them.

Next, the program manager uses that data and the target Scenario to forecast the time and money required to finish the program. The measurement method can depend on the type of program, and it’s not fully deterministic but should be adjusted by the opinion of the expert program manager. Consider the optimal level of accuracy and precision for the measurements, and don’t go above those levels so that your energy is not wasted and you don’t create the illusion of control.

When forecasting the required investment, it’s important to consider the effort required for enabling the expected outcomes as well as the effort required for sustaining those outcomes. The latter is sometimes overlooked. You should be focused on measuring things that contribute to your forecasts. Wrong measurements waste your energy, but more importantly, they may be harmful, as people involved in the program align themselves with the measurements, and wrong measurements could mislead them.

You may need to prepare more than one type of report for different types of stakeholders. The content and format of these reports vary; some might be sent every time this activity is run, while some would be sent less frequently (e.g., every fourth time this activity is run). In general, simpler reports are more effective. You should document the reporting requirements of stakeholders in the stakeholders list of the Program Description.