Spreadsheets spread because they are fast. A package manager needs a list. A commercial manager needs a change log. A commissioning lead needs a system tracker. Each list starts honest. Within a month they disagree on dates, percent complete and what “done” means. The meeting then spends its time choosing which file to believe.
One view of the truth is not a slogan for software. It is a rule: one network, one data date, one progress measure, and reports that are extracts—not rival models.
How ten spreadsheets quietly take over
- The master schedule is hard to filter, so packages keep private plans.
- Procurement dates live in email and a buyer’s sheet, not as predecessors.
- Commissioning runs a separate readiness list with different completes.
- Cost and schedule close on different weeks.
- Leadership asks for “a simple tracker,” and another unofficial file is born.
Each sheet solves a local pain. Together they destroy comparability.
What “one view” must include
One view means the critical path, near-critical float, open interfaces, instructed change and the next decision gate can all be read from the same update. It does not mean every person opens Primavera. It means every person is looking at a cut of the same truth.
| Many spreadsheets | One integrated view |
|---|---|
| Private package dates | Coded WBS everyone can filter |
| Separate done criteria | Shared progress rules |
| Different cut-offs | One data date |
| Manual reconciliation | Reports extracted from the network |
| Argument about whose file | Argument about the path and the decision |
The cost of reconciliation
Reconciliation is unpaid work. Someone sits between the sheets and invents a story that almost matches all of them. That person becomes the bottleneck. When they are away, the project has no agreed status. One view removes that role by making status a property of the file, not of the translator.
How to move from ten sheets to one view
- Name the official schedule and retire rival finish dates.
- Put procurement, design release and commissioning prerequisites on the network where they gate work.
- Agree progress rules by activity type and freeze them.
- Publish package and board views as filters or exports from that file.
- Refuse a new tracker unless it is a temporary input that dies after the update.
What directors should demand
Ask which file is official. Ask whether every package closed on the same data date. Ask whether the look-ahead rolls up to the master. If the answers require three emails, you do not have one view yet.
EVM Solutions builds that single view: integrated planning, controls and reporting on one data date. If your project is drowning in trackers, send the master schedule and the three sheets people actually use. The overlaps will show where the truth fractured—and where one network can put it back together.
