There are certain things which are very important for business managers while delivering products/services using project portfolio management; such as

  • Selecting right projects for the business, considering value-benefit-risk analysis
  • Managing project financials (budget, estimated cost, actual cost, billing, margins, etc) to meet the financial success of the project
  • Optimal utilisation of available resources, requesting additional resources based on data/facts to ensure smooth delivery
  • Regularly tracking health and status of various initiatives (projects) in a given portfolio and taking corrective actions as necessary


Keeping above things in mind, let's look at following crucial project portfolio aspects you can manage using ZilicusPM


Portfolio Manager (User Role, Access) 

Account administrator can set Portfolio Manager role to specific individuals. Only those users with Portfolio Manager role in ZilicusPM can access, create portfolio and manage their own portfolios. Refer this guide to set up user roles and their access permissions.


Project Approval Process

Portfolio manager can look at project requests before approving. (Note that), Using ZilicusPM you can set a project management process wherein every new project request has to be approved by senior manager. You can configure ZilicusPM to enforce such process. Once enabled, whenever new project is created, it is submitted as a request for approval. Approving manager can look at budget requested, schedule plan, team composition, risk plan, etc and accordingly, approve/reject/ask-for-more-info. Till the time, project is not approved by authority, it remains in a planning state and does not consume/block resources. Refer this guide for  project approval process.


Project Portfolio Information

When a portfolio manager creates portfolio, there is certain information s/he would like to set as a guideline such as what are the strategic goals the portfolio is expected to meet, what are the objectives current portfolio should achieve, etc. S/he can also set budget, indicate health of the portfolio, etc.

Refer this guide about project portfolio information.


Project Portfolio Dashboard

It is very important and crucial for senior/executive management to know how different initiatives under their leadership are progressing. The selection of projects based on qualification criteria is usually done by portfolio managers but once projects are funded and kicked-off, the real test is not passed until the benefits of those projects are delivered to end-user/client. The project portfolio dashboard shows the mirror, how different projects in a given portfolio are performing on various parameters. ZilicusPM offers 40+ project portfolio KPIs for portfolio managers. Refer this guide to know more about project portfolio dashboard.


Project Portfolio Reports

ZilicusPM has set of project portfolio reports that portfolio managers can access to track health of portfolio of projects in terms of status, budget, cost, issues, risks, changes, resources, billing, earned value, etc. Refer Reports tab in ZilicusPM application and also refer this portfolio reports guide for more information. Portfolio dashboard and reports are accessible from and at, multiple places depending on the context. In order to get more information, you can request a training session with your account manager.


Project Portfolio Gantt Chart

Senior management who wants to track progress of various projects as a part of given portfolio can do so, using portfolio Gantt chart in ZilicusPM. Once portfolio Gantt chart is generated, one find projects timeline displayed such that each project is rendered as a single bar, which can be 

  • Expanded to view details of task schedule and latest progress status
  • Zoom in/out do view it better
  • Even the single bar representing project timeline displays the progress bar (filled with white color inside Gray color bar).

Refer this guide for more information about portfolio Gantt chart report.


Project Portfolio Budget

While creating portfolio, portfolio owner can set budget for a given portfolio. Though there is no change/approval process for portfolio budget; keep in mind that portfolio budget reflects in the portfolio dashboard and senior managers to whom portfolio owners reports can quickly check the portfolio dashboard. Portfolio managers, executive management can also check the budget set for the portfolio, allocated to projects and percentage of used budget for set of portfolios. One can drill down to find more about budget allocated across projects of a given portfolio. Refer this guide to create portfolio and set portfolio budget.


Project Portfolio Risks

Project portfolio managers can check status (Open, Reviewed, Not-Reviewed) and impact (Catastrophic, Major, Minor, Insignificant, etc) of various risks reported in all projects across portfolios. Portfolio managers can visually check these project portfolio risk KPIs through dashboard or load multiple risk related reports available in reports section and drill down to check 

  • Risk assessment
  • Risk response strategy
  • Contingency plan
  • Mitigation Plan
  • Implementation/ due date
  • Assigned resource


Project Portfolio Changes

Project portfolio managers can check status and impact of various changes reported in all projects across portfolios. Portfolio managers can visually check these project portfolio change KPIs through dashboard or load multiple changes related reports available in reports section.


Project Portfolio Issues

Project portfolio managers can check status and priorities of various issues reported in all projects across portfolios. Portfolio managers can visually check these project portfolio risk KPIs through dashboard or load multiple issues related reports available in reports section.


Resource Management Across Project Portfolio

Managing resources across project needs both macro as well as micro perspectives. ZilicusPM offers both, in terms of resource dashboard, reports and ability to control resource workload, generic resources, re-assignment, replacement, etc. Project portfolio managers can look at 

  • Resource Load Chart (Daily, Weekly, Monthly basis), as well as 
  • Resource Capacity Planning report to get a sense of current workload, upcoming/past demand
  • Resource dashboard/ reports displaying resource overload, capacity utilisation, under-utilisation or over-utilisation. 


On the other hand, project managers have refined control over 

  • Selecting right resources (skill, role, availability) as well as 
  • Making resource-allocation, assignment, etc at a project level, task level
  • Project specific % allocation of resources
  • Project specific resource hourly rates
  • Assigning multiple resources to single task
  • Changing resource workload per task, per day
  • Un-assigning tasks to resources, etc

Refer this resource management guide. Kindly consult your account manager to organise training or get more information.






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Explore ZilicusPM project portfolio management software (PPM tool) that gives you ability to select right projects in your portfolio, track projects status in holistic perspective, keep a tab on portfolio financials as well. ZilicusPM can be your best project portfolio management software. 


About Zilicus 

Zilicus offers the best project portfolio management tool ZilicusPM, with robust project management tools capabilities and easy ways to track project management KPI, project dashboard, etc.


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