Four Blocker, A better way to manage and track a program

Introduction to Program tracking

As a PM Consultant and a contractor I have about 5-10 projects going on at any one time. Each project has a broad list of tasks and action items, Milestones, requirements, deadlines, resources, risks, issues, and different end dates. RAG (Red, Amber, Green) Status needs to be communicated to the Management/ Steering committee every week and its easy to miss or undermine issues and risks because as a project manager you may have too many balls to juggle and its easy to drop some without an effective project tracking process.

Sometimes it is too much and if you are not very organized then there has to be a better way.

What is your better way?

Now let me ask you if you are tracking project status, of as many as 10-15 or even more small to large size projects?

I introduced the concept of four blocker while working for an investment bank in New York. I borrowed this idea from one of my previous, a 6 sigma frenzy client and added my own values in it. 

Let me explain it how it works, four blocker consists of four blocks as name suggests. 

0.Status Summary,
1. Planned Accomplishments (from last week)
2. Actual Accomplishment (for this week)
3. known Risks and Issues
4. Planned Accomplishment (for next week)

#0 is merely an overall summary
If #1 is  not equal to #2 then there must be an explanation in #3.
#4 is a common denominator to tie two weekly statuses.

if #1 and #2 are not equal, then the status can not be Green. It would be either Amber or Red. What determines red or Amber is the severity of issues.

Severity of the issues must be determined by level of impact of the issue on Milestone or project end date, other projects etc. This model can be customized based on the project needs.

<<Draft>>