Reporting Program Progress – Playbook Review Part 9

In part eight, we discussed the various elements of implementing a construction strategy including insourcing versus outsourcing tactics, field productivity reporting, and key performance indicators (KPIs). Now we will examine various methods for reporting your resiliency program’s progress. This step is critical for ensuring the week-to-week, month-to-month, and year-to-year progress is on target and for demonstrating the success of the program. This is covered in more detail in chapter six of PDi²’s Utility Infrastructure Resiliency Playbook.

Earned Value Analysis (EVA) Progress Reporting Technique

A superior method of overall progress reporting that incorporates week-to-week, month-to-month, and year-to-year presentation is Earned Value Analysis (EVA).

This method requires the initial development of a detailed budget, an accurate schedule, and an ability to accurately forecast future construction costs. When utilized, EVA presents a Cost Performance Index (CPI) and  Schedule Performance Index (SPI) to assist in determining if a long-duration construction effort is on target.

End-of-Year Reporting

At the conclusion of each year and in anticipation of routine regulatory reporting, lessons-learned type exercises should be undertaken. These might include:

• Financial returns year-to-date
• Program organization performance and changes
• Feedback from work evaluation
• Feedback from commissioning tests
• Overall lessons learned

Overall Progress Reporting

In preparation for Overall Progress Reporting, a comparison against the overall program objective should be calculated and presented. These might include:

• Reduced Total Length of Restoration (TLR)
• Improved reliability as measured by geographic-specific SAIDI, SAIFI, or any of the customer outage-centric measures
• Customer satisfaction
• Operational or maintenance change
• Units hardened
• Security measures taken
• Assessment of maintenance and general readiness
• Implementation of modernization, control enhancements, and smart-grid technology
• Diversified and integrated grid
• Redundancy, backup equipment, and inventory management
• Mutual aid program use
• Succession training, knowledge transfer, and workforce development
• Business continuity and emergency action planning
• Update models used for forecasting and planning purposes

Reporting Dashboards

To present the various types of reporting, a standard dashboard should be prepared using three tiers and levels of detail. Metrics should build upon one another.

• An executive-level summarizing and presenting no more than 3-5 overall metrics describing program performance.
• A more detailed management level with 10-20 metrics presented at both the project and program level.
• An even more detailed field level with 20-40 metrics and presented at the project level.

In addition, routine reporting of program progress should link directly to the later reporting of Overall Reporting Program Progress to secure reauthorization and continuation of the resiliency efforts.

Download the Playbook

Stay tuned for our next post on evaluating overall program success against the original objective. Until then, consider downloading a free copy of PDi²’s Utility Infrastructure Resiliency Playbook. Designed to help utilities address obstacles they might face when developing resiliency programs, this comprehensive resource includes details on each step of developing a program, case studies, and links to additional resources.