Hi everyone,

as I have grown quite fond of OpenProject for project management activities, I have found quite a few use cases, that could enrich this software in regards of multi project management. More specifically, I am thinking about (standardized) report, project controlling aspects etc. Even with rather simple implementations, this may have a huge impact, as right now, the portfolio and multi project management aspect is rather new.

With this thread I would like to start a discussion, if this applies to others as well and where the largest benefits could be.

Core idea

Usually, as a project manager I will have to report to some sort of management. In an environment with multiple projects flying around, I can't bother with each project having different templates for their reporting and documentation needs. In fact, I would expect an organization to define minimum standards regarding documentation, reporting, etc. that have to be applied in every project. This is, where organizations often tend to rely on "hand-made" solutions, i.e. excel or word templates. However, a software-supported approach can do the same and even enforce and support said standards.

Which features and use cases could be relevant?

Risk management and risk register

Each project has risks that you would document in structured manner. Therefore, a risk register would list project risks, their impact, possible resolutions, potential costs etc.

Risks are usually part of a project status report for the management or executive level.

Change requests

Change requests tend to have some sort of impact on the project, may it be costs, scope, time, quality, deliverables, etc.

A new would therefore offer the opportunity to propose, review and accept/decline change requests in a structured and comparable manner. Luckily, nextcloud integration already enables links to documents, e.g. underlying concepts, that would be attached to a change request.

Status reports

OpenProject already offers status reports as a free-form. However, status reports usually included a compressed view of the project, also including aspects that may not be captured elsewhere. Usually status reports include an overview over

• Financials: How much of the budget has been ussed, will be used, is still neded?
• Progress:
  • What has been done since the last report? (this may be more of a semantic summary, as executives tend not to look into every work package, of course)
  • What will be done next?
• Time: Are we on track?
• Change requests (if any), see above
• major risks
• etc.

A feature for status reports could aid project managers to create status reports based on (system-wide) configurable templates, offering general management and executives to get their info from a standardized format and thus enable them to focus on the content, not the format. Also, if the report has structured information, you could, of course do all sorts of evaluations across all projects in your organization.

General project information

A project usually delivers something for someone.  This may be documented by a variety of documents (e.g. project initiation documentation as in Prince2, contracts, etc.). Next to that, a project consists of people, plans etc.

Besides the current implementation (the text field for project description) there is lots of potential to go into more detail with a sophisticated project description. This may include:

• Project team and roles, such as project manager, sponsor, customer, process owner, product owner, etc.
• Stakeholders
• Business case (or at least the assignment)
• assumptions and conditions
• deliverables
• etc.

As with the status report, you could fore this information to be documented in a structured manner.

Discussion

Is this in line with OpenProject "philosophy"?

From my literal user experience, OpenProject is more geared towards single projects while offering lightweight features to get a rough overview of all projects. Also, the focus seems to be a tad more on the project teams, offering lots of features revolving around task management, team planning, etc.

However(!). in my opinion this does not exclude more sophisticated features geared towards multi project management. For example, you can activate and deactivate modules such as the meetings module or the budget module. The same may apply to all the features mentioned above, meaning that the core of the software will always be what it is today.

What do the community and developers think?

Can't answer that of course. This is where everyone else is invited to comment on this proposal.