Project controls: 5 key controls for project phases

Businesses must prioritize saving time and money to stay competitive. One of the easiest ways to do this is by implementing project controls within your project management approach. In this piece, we'll explain what project controls are, who's responsible for them, and how to use them throughout your project lifecycle.

What are project controls in project management?

Project controls are processes used to monitor and influence the time, cost, and resources spent on a project, helping teams stay on schedule and within budget. Each control focuses on a specific part of the project plan, such as schedule, resources, risk, change, or performance.

The goal of using project controls is to stay within project scope, minimize the project budget when possible, and stick to the project schedule.

Project controls vs. project management

Project controls and project management overlap in their functions. Both processes help you keep a project on track and within scope. However, project controls aren't as broad in their purpose as project management.

While project management focuses on keeping the entire project on track, including people, processes, and deliverables, project controls focus specifically on quality control in order to save time and money.

You can think of project management as the umbrella for everything involved in delivering a project, like team coordination and stakeholder communication. Project controls are the specific tools under that umbrella that help you track and adjust cost, schedule, and performance.

Why project controls are important

Project controls provide information that enables project managers to make informed, timely decisions that mitigate project risks. From project initiation to completion, your job as project manager is to keep things on track and within scope.

Without project controls, it's difficult to answer key questions that affect project success. Here's what can go off track:

• People: Unclear roles and responsibilities lead to confusion about who owns tasks.

• Quality: Expectations may not be met if progress isn't monitored at each phase.

• Cost: Uncontrolled spending leads to budget overruns due to stakeholder changes or miscalculations.

• Time: Schedule delays and resource conflicts result in missed deadlines.

With project controls, you can spot problems early and make quick adjustments to keep your project moving forward.

Who is responsible for project controls

Who manages project controls depends on the size of the project, the industry, and how the organization is set up. Often, the project manager takes care of controls as part of their daily work.

For larger projects, a dedicated project controller may focus exclusively on monitoring schedules, tracking budgets, and flagging risks. In industries like construction and engineering, entire teams may cover areas like cost engineering and risk analysis.

The 5 project management controls

Here are five project controls you can use to get better insight into your project plan.

1. Schedule

Visibility into your project schedule helps you stay on track. Make sure you're tracking all work in one place, like a project management tool, so you can see tasks, deadlines, and dependencies at a glance.

Key schedule control practices include:

• Set milestones: Use checkpoints to gauge progress throughout the project.

• Use status reports: Share biweekly or monthly updates to keep stakeholders informed.

• Troubleshoot early: If something's off track, pinpoint the issue and course correct quickly.

Quick tip: Use a Gantt chart to see your project schedule broken down by tasks and milestones. This type of chart can help you assess how long a project will take and show you dependencies between tasks.

2. Resource

Every project depends on resources like time, money, and team availability. Resource management helps you control costs and monitor materials throughout the project lifecycle.

You need to see what resources you have from the beginning and track them as the project moves forward. If you go over budget or lose a team member, having controls helps you find solutions quickly.

Quick tip: Try calculating cost variance to analyze whether you're performing at the right rate to stay within your means. The formula to calculate cost variance is CV = EV – AC (earned value minus actual cost).

3. Risk

Project risk management is a crucial project control to identify and prevent risks from derailing your project. The best way to do this is with a risk register, where you rank potential risks by priority and assess how to manage them accordingly.

Quick tip: Common risk scenarios include data security, communication issues, scheduling delays, unplanned work, and material theft. Use these categories to begin brainstorming your risk register.

4. Change

Change control is one of the best ways to prevent project scope creep, which can lead to timeline delays, increased budget, and project defects. When you implement a change control process, you'll feel prepared for any project changes that come your way.

A change control process lets you decide which changes are important and which ones you can make without hurting your timeline or scope. This way, your team can handle changes well and feel confident in their decisions.

Quick tip: Typically, the change control process is project-specific. For larger organizational change, consider implementing a change management program.

5. Performance

Performance management is the broad process of monitoring your project's success. The simplest way to do this is to set key performance indicators (KPIs) to assess project performance. These may include tracking costs against baselines, on-time completion, billed hours, and return on investment.

No matter what goals you set, make sure they're quantifiable, specific, and measurable. When in doubt, use the SMART goal method (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound).

Quick tip: A good KPI should track one measurable value that you or your team can influence in a timely manner. It should also give team members a clear sense of how their projects contribute to company goals.

When you use these project controls, you can feel confident that you're monitoring your project from all angles. This will ultimately save you time and money and help you create successful project deliverables.

Examples of project controls

It’s easier to understand project controls with real examples. Here are a few:

• Schedule control: A marketing team uses a Gantt chart to spot a creative approval delay early and reallocates resources to stay on track.

• Cost control: A software team monitors burn rate weekly and catches a 15% overspend in time to adjust scope.

• Risk control: A construction team's risk register flags supply chain issues, so they already have backup suppliers ready.

• Change control: When a client requests new features, the team evaluates the timeline and budget effects before committing.

These examples show how project controls help you spot problems early and keep your projects on track.

Where to use project controls

Controlling your project is just as important as delivering your project. Implement project controls at every stage of the project life cycle to avoid unexpected surprises.

Project planning (initiation)

The planning phase is your opportunity to set up controls from the start. The more detailed your plan is now, the less you’ll have to manage controls later.

Project planning includes:

• Outlining your project timeline

• Assigning roles and responsibilities

• Creating a work breakdown structure (WBS)

• Identifying stakeholders

• Creating project objectives

• Planning your budget and estimating future costs

Project execution

When your project moves into development, it’s time to put your control processes into action. As your team works on the project, these controls will help you track progress.

Make sure you've accounted for the five project controls at each stage. If you'd like a faster way to share updates, try using a progress report template to turn check-ins into quick, consistent summaries.

Project closure

After submitting your completed deliverables to all project stakeholders, use the information you've gathered from your project control processes to lead a post-mortem meeting.

The post-mortem meeting is an opportunity to reflect on what you've learned and receive guidance for future projects. This step allows you to take any learnings from this experience into future projects.

Manage your projects with project management software

Managing multiple parts of your project at once can get chaotic. Because the control process happens while the project is in motion, you have to keep track of project controls while also ensuring your team stays focused on high-impact work.

With project management software, you can track and monitor project progress, stay on top of important metrics, and get the bird's-eye view you need to keep your project on schedule and within budget. Ready to bring your project controls together in one place? Get started with Asana today.

Frequently asked questions about project controls