Project reporting template

"What's the status of this project?"

If you're a project manager, you've heard this question before. Instead of digging through dashboards, scanning your inbox, and checking with your team, imagine having a single source of truth where you can quickly see what's been completed, what's next, and how far you have to go to reach your project goals.

Enter: The project reporting template.

What is a project reporting template?

A project reporting template is a reusable framework that helps you quickly create a project report, such as a weekly status report or monthly progress report. It standardizes the information you track, so you can copy the template, fill in the required details, and start working right away.

Project reporting goes beyond updating stakeholders. It helps you keep work on track, address blockers, and ensure deliverables are completed on time. Your template provides an at-a-glance view of what needs to be done next and how you're progressing toward your project goals.

Types of project reports

Not all project reports serve the same purpose. The type of report you create depends on your audience, reporting cadence, and the level of detail stakeholders need.

• Weekly status report: A brief update on what was completed last week, what's in progress, and what's planned for the coming week. Ideal for keeping teams aligned on short-term priorities.

• Monthly progress report: A broader view of project health that tracks milestones, budget status, and timeline adherence. Useful for department leads and project sponsors.

• Executive summary report: A high-level overview designed for senior leadership. Focuses on key metrics, risks, and strategic alignment rather than task-level details.

• Quarterly review report: Evaluates project performance over a longer period. Often includes visual dashboards, trend analysis, and recommendations for the next quarter.

• Project completion report: A final report summarizing outcomes, lessons learned, and how results compared to original goals. Helps teams improve future project planning.

Choosing the right report type helps you communicate the right information to the right audience at the right time.

Benefits of a digital project reporting template

No project is set in stone. Priorities and timelines evolve, and as your team completes deliverables, you get closer to accomplishing your project goal. A digital project reporting template captures change over time in a way that static templates can't.

It updates in real time, so you always know what's been completed and what's next. If priorities shift, you can update your template to keep stakeholders in the loop.

With a digital project reporting template, you can:

• Track task completion in real time.

• Give stakeholders a single source of truth for your project's status.

• See at a glance how you're progressing toward project goals.

• Easily update your template if timelines or priorities change.

• Track goals, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), project deliverables, and project status in one place.

• Visualize your reporting template with customizable dashboards, without doing any extra work.

• Assign tasks and set deadlines, so it's clear who's doing what by when.

• Attach relevant Google Docs, spreadsheets, images, and more.

How to structure your digital project reporting template

At its most basic, your project reporting template should include:

• Current progress toward each of your project goals.

• Tasks you're currently prioritizing.

• Any issues or blockers that could impact progress.

• Completed tasks or project milestones.

Create a section for each of these buckets:

1. Progress toward goals

In this section, document your project objectives, the KPIs you'll use to measure them, and your current progress. Track this information with the following columns:

• Goal: An overarching objective you want to achieve. For example, "increase home page traffic."

• KPI: A metric to track progress against your goal. For example, you could measure home page traffic by tracking site visitors.

• Current performance: The current measurement of your chosen KPI. For example, "1.2M site visitors."

• Desired performance: The target measurement required to achieve your project goal. For example, "2M site visitors."

• Due date: The projected timeline for each goal.

• Assignee: The person responsible for monitoring and achieving each objective.

Tracking goals in a digital project reporting template works well for individual teams, but you can level up your goal-tracking process with Asana's Goals feature. Instead of just working at the team level, Goals is an organization-wide tool that helps your entire company set, track, and communicate goals.

2. Tasks you're currently prioritizing

Seeing tasks that are "on deck" helps you proactively remove blockers that may impact upcoming work. Having an overview of prioritized tasks also paints a picture of how your project is progressing over time.

This section can look different depending on your project's needs. A weekly status report template could include tasks from your team's to-do list for the current week.

3. Completed tasks or milestones

This section shows what you've accomplished so far. It illustrates concrete progress on each deliverable and helps you queue up the next tasks.

Tailor it to your project's needs, for example, tasks completed last week or a list of all completed milestones for your entire project.

4. Issues or blockers

Create a section to document any blockers or bottlenecks that could impact upcoming work. This helps you proactively resolve issues before they become larger problems, and it helps stakeholders understand why certain deliverables are taking longer than expected.

How to write a project status report

Writing a project status report becomes straightforward when you follow a consistent process. Here are seven steps to create an effective report:

1. Define your audience: Determine who will read the report. Executives need high-level summaries, while team members benefit from detailed task updates.

2. Set a reporting cadence: Decide how often you'll share updates. Weekly reports work well for fast-moving projects, while monthly reports suit longer initiatives.

3. Gather your data: Pull together task completion rates, milestone progress, budget updates, and any risks or blockers from your project management tool.

4. Summarize project health: Use a simple status indicator (on track, at risk, off track) to give readers an immediate sense of where the project stands.

5. Highlight completed work: List key accomplishments since the last report. This builds confidence with stakeholders and shows momentum.

6. Flag risks and blockers: Be transparent about challenges. Include what's being done to address each issue and any support needed from stakeholders.

7. Outline next steps: Share upcoming priorities and deadlines, so readers know what to expect before the next update.

A well-structured reporting process saves time and keeps everyone focused on the work that matters most.

Best practices for project reporting

Effective project reporting goes beyond filling in a template. These best practices help you create reports that stakeholders actually read and act on:

• Keep it concise: Focus on what changed since the last report. Avoid repeating background information that stakeholders already know.

• Use visuals: Charts, progress bars, and color-coded status indicators make reports easier to scan and understand at a glance.

• Tailor to your audience: Adjust the level of detail based on who's reading. Executive stakeholders want summaries, project teams want specifics.

• Be consistent: Use the same format and cadence for every report. Consistency builds trust and makes it easier to spot trends over time.

• Focus on outcomes: Report on progress toward goals, not just completed tasks. Connecting activities to objectives shows the bigger picture.

• Automate where possible: Use your project management tool to pull real-time data into reports instead of manually compiling information from multiple sources.

Features and apps to try

Try out these features and app integrations to get the most out of your project reporting template:

Integrated features

• Reporting. Reporting in Asana translates project data into visual charts and digestible graphs. Because all of your team's work is already in Asana, you can pull data from any project or team to get an accurate picture of what's happening in one place.

• Custom fields. Custom fields are the best way to tag, sort, and filter work. Create unique custom fields for any information you need to track, from priority and status to email or phone number. Use custom fields to sort and schedule your to-dos so you know what to work on first.

• Milestones. Milestones represent important project checkpoints. By setting milestones throughout your project, you can let your team members and project stakeholders know how you're pacing towards your goal. Use milestones as a chance to celebrate the little wins on the path towards the big project goal.

• Start dates. Sometimes, you don't just need to track when a to-do is due; you also need to know when you should start working on it. Start times and dates give your team members a clear sense of how long each task should take to complete.

Recommended apps

• Google Workplace. Attach files directly to tasks in Asana using the Google Workplace file chooser built into the Asana task pane.

• Dropbox. Attach files directly to tasks in Asana using the Dropbox file chooser built into the Asana task pane.

• OneDrive. Attach files directly to tasks in Asana using the Microsoft OneDrive file chooser built into the Asana task pane. Easily attach files from Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and more.

• Jira. Create interactive, connected workflows between technical and business teams to increase real-time visibility into the product development process, all without leaving Asana.

Streamline your project reporting with Asana

Tracking project progress shouldn't require hours of manual work. With Asana, you can build project reporting templates that update in real time, so you always have an accurate picture of where things stand. Create custom dashboards, set goals, assign tasks, and share progress with stakeholders, all in one place.

Get started with Asana today.

FAQs about project reporting templates