Running head: PROJECT STATUS REPORTS 1 Project Status Reports Name Institution Project Status Reports The purpose of this paper is to analyze three project status reports. The differences and similarities between these reports will be considered. The paper will also present recommendations for changes that are intended to enhance the quality of the selected reports. The first status report is a \"Periodic Progress Summary.\" This report is formatted in a way that allows the team members and stakeholders to assess the status of the project, main current activities, and progress in a quick way. The \"what we are going to do\" and \"what we did\" sections assist in establishing a measure for the team and to keep the management informed about progress and early signs of blunder. Moreover, the \"issues\" section assists to expose the risk areas in time, concentrate on tasks to avoid or reduce the risks, and convey a likely need for assistance from outside (Project status reports, 2011). Notably, when a particular project is going on in a smooth manner, there ought to be a noticeable connection between the \"Upcoming tasks for this period\" of the report and the \"Key accomplishments last period\" of the report. Indeed, a PROJECT STATUS REPORTS 2 larger number of the task accounts ought to just transform their act verbs to take up the 'past tense' form. The second status report is the \"Major Task Completion Report.\" Apparently, this report gives the status for a project stage, putting importance on the reporting of accomplishment status of the main project tasks. The format for this report can be utilized to provide status on the present phase, or one can enlarge it to encompass all main phases. Moreover, one can lessen the level of detail in every phase and decide to report on a reduced number of the chief milestones. Indeed, this report is an excellent summary for the functional managers and team members. By offering the actual and planned start, as well as end dates for a variety of milestones, it allows the analyst to find out whether that particular project is on the course (Project status reports, 2011). However, this report does not offer a complete picture for reporting to the senior management since it does not provide substantially targeted and well-summarized information on the issues they require comprehending about where to put focus to help the project succeed. Accordingly, at most, the comments or status column ought to be utilized to communication some of such information. The third status report is the \"Work-Plan Measure.\" The report offers the status of a project, emphasizing on reporting the completion metrics on a variety of items. Indeed, the report is an excellent companion to the second report discussed in this paper, for the team members to maintain visible the work, which is being carried out and what is remaining. The status on the first report discussed offer the time outlook of the tasks in the project. This report offers an entirely objective amount of the work linked to all tasks and the amount of the work that has already been accomplished (Project status reports, 2011). However, there is a need to replace the work metrics and items, which fit the projects and be able to make sense to maintain visible in this manner. Apparently, other examples in which this could be helpful encompass projects PROJECT STATUS REPORTS 3 testing phases, where the test cases are put down and executed including publications/writing projects. In this case, this refers to web projects in which a large number of elements of the graphics, page contents, and page designs among others have to be created. Reference Project status reports, (2011). Retrieved April 8, 2016. From, https://www.projectconnections.com/knowhow/subsets/sample-templates/sample-statusreports.pdf