What is a progress report?
A progress report is an overview document that records the progress in terms of status changes and development for an individual, team, or project over a specific period of time. It helps different stakeholders communicate their progress with other team members.
Benefits of a progress report
As a progress report summarizes the changes for all relevant parties, it helps with the following:
- Accountability: A progress report provides a performance snapshot of different individuals, teams, and departments. It helps leaders identify the bottlenecks they can focus on to move their plan forward.
- Communication: According to Grammarly, leaders have experienced a year-over-year productivity drop of 15% due to poor communication. A progress report can mitigate major communication challenges by ensuring everyone is on the same page regarding priority projects.
- Resource allocation: Progress reports show the budget and assignees of different tasks, which helps team members understand what their colleagues are working on. Plus, if something appears amiss, other parties can immediately suggest adjustments.
What does a progress report include?
A progress report can use a standard template but should be customized in different situations. You might prefer to include different sections based on your business needs. That said, here are a few components that make it to most types of progress reports:
Introductory information
You must include brief details describing the document for other parties, whether it’s a project progress report or an employee daily progress report. For example, you might include:
- Project name
- Assigned persons
- Reporting period
Tasks completed
If it’s a progress report covering an ongoing project, you must list the tasks you completed after the previous progress report to update everyone involved about the latest developments.
Challenges
If your team identified any specific risks or issues in the recent reporting period, share them with the rest of the organization so they can pitch in and discuss possible ways forward.
Tasks to be done
Based on the progress in the report, outline the upcoming tasks, their assignees, and expected due dates. You can also mention the objectives or goals of each task.
.png)