A report that gets the next decision made.

Begin with the decision

An owner report earns its place when it helps someone choose a course of action. A long list of completed tasks may explain how busy the team has been while leaving the important question unanswered: what must happen next, who can authorize it, and when does the choice become expensive?

Use the report to connect four things: a verified condition, its effect on the current forecast, a recommended decision, and the latest useful decision date. Keep background detail available in the supporting record. The front page should let a reader distinguish a fact from an estimate without attending the meeting.

Start with the decisions already embodied in the current drawings and specifications. The design team and owner have developed and vetted those requirements; the owner’s representative relies on that retained expertise and carries the requirements into construction. Many “what?” and “who?” questions can be answered by citing that record and its assigned review roles. Ask for a new decision only where a requirement, current condition, or review disposition leaves a real gap.

This method suits a weekly coordination report for a construction or renovation project. It is a reporting structure, not a substitute for the contractual notice process, an authorization to proceed, or a claim that an estimate has been independently validated.

Build the control chain

1. Freeze a reporting cutoff

State the date through which the information is current. Use that same cutoff for the schedule, cost forecast, and decision register. If one source is older, identify its date beside the affected statement. “Updated this week” is too vague when the schedule and cost report cover different reporting periods.

2. Keep the baseline and forecast separate

The baseline records the authorized comparison point. The forecast describes what the team currently expects. A later forecast does not silently move the approved milestone. Report both dates and explain the cause of the difference. If an approved change revises the baseline, reference that authorization and retain the earlier version.

The monthly progress payment may include eligible stored materials before they reach the site or are installed. Show installed work, onsite storage, approved offsite storage, and in-transit or not-yet-delivered items separately. Follow the contract’s payment terms and supporting evidence requirements, including applicable waivers and insurance. A payment or approved product submittal does not establish physical progress.

3. Write the consequence before the color

Describe a specific impact: “The proposed access window falls after the equipment delivery date, so storage and a second mobilization may be needed.” Then identify what is known, what is still estimated, and what evidence will resolve the uncertainty. A red or green status can help scanning, but it cannot carry that explanation.

4. Give each decision a usable deadline

First check the current specification section, drawing revision, and required submittal status. For specified equipment, the action is usually for the general contractor to coordinate and submit the current proposal for the design team’s and owner’s required reviews—not to ask the owner to select the equipment again. Record the returned disposition and any outstanding conditions. Route an unresolved design question through the project’s clarification or request-for-information process; route a proposed substitution or scope change through its required authorization process.

Work backward from the affected activity using procurement, review, and implementation time. This produces a decision deadline with a reason. Identify the person or role with authority to decide, the person preparing the answer, the alternatives, and the consequence of deferral. Avoid “ASAP”; it provides no scheduling information.

Separate a required response date from a commitment to deliver it. Have the party controlling each milestone confirm its own scope and date: the manufacturer for fabrication, the carrier for transport, the trade partner for installation, or the designated reviewer for its response. The general contractor coordinates these commitments, including confirmations from a subcontractor’s or vendor’s own suppliers; it does not turn its planning estimate into their promise. Retain the confirming party, date, conditions, evidence, and current document revision.

5. Close the loop in the next issue

Record the actual decision, its date, and the evidence of authorization. Update the linked forecast only after checking the decision’s scope. An agreed meeting action is not necessarily a contract modification.

Verbal directives given in meetings can have contractual significance, depending on the contract documents and the authority of the person giving the direction. Record these conversations promptly in the meeting minutes, identifying who gave the directive, what was decided, when it occurred, and any potential cost or schedule impact, then distribute the minutes to the project team. Follow up with the formal notices and change documentation required by the contract documents, within the required time limits. Meeting minutes do not automatically replace a separate notice or written authorization required by the contract.

Carry unresolved decisions forward under the same identifier so their age and history remain visible.

Worked example: an access window

Use the workbook

Start with the Guide sheet and inspect Worked example. Create a separate working copy, then use Report for your project. The workbook provides fifteen blank record rows. Enter the reporting date, then replace example decisions and milestones with authorized project information. Use stable identifiers; do not recycle an identifier after a decision closes.

Complete the lower Requirement basis block for each row. Its record identifier follows the main register. Enter the requirement document and revision, the design and owner review role, required submittal or request, actual disposition and supporting evidence, and the contractor’s confirmation that the basis remains current. Evidence linked means those fields are populated; it is not an approval, authorization to proceed, or assessment of the review’s adequacy.

Use the linked commitment record to name the responsible entity and its scope, confirmation status and date, evidence, conditions, and the contractor’s separate forecast and coordination action. Carry the current requirement revision with the evidence. A completed record is not independent confirmation; an unconfirmed date remains an estimate.

For each open decision, enter the question, accountable decision owner, required-by date, current status, and a reference to the evidence behind it. The workbook can help organize dates and unresolved items. It cannot determine who has contractual authority, confirm that an attached record is valid, or choose the appropriate action.

The workbook does not automatically retain revision history and has no dedicated answer-date field. Preserve the dated decision, authorization, and earlier versions in the supporting record referenced by the row. The file is a reporting aid, not the complete decision archive.

Use the evidence reference to identify the specification section, drawing revision, submittal identifier and revision, review disposition, and contractual review role that support the row. If specifications are unavailable, identify the documented basis you do have and assign the missing requirement to the responsible design professional or owner representative. Leave the gap explicit rather than filling it with an invented requirement.

The report distinguishes billed share, accrual-cost share, optional earned-value share, and separately entered physical progress. These are different measures: payment is not physical completion. Use the Guide’s definitions and enter zero only when you mean zero; leave unavailable inputs blank. Milestone variance is forecast minus baseline in calendar days, not a working-calendar calculation.

Use Stored materials to retain payment eligibility and location evidence and reconcile the stored balance with gross billing. Stored worked example shows a separate fictional transfer from stored to installed value without billing it twice. Its reconciliation does not calculate physical progress or approve payment.

Before issuing the report, reconcile each priority decision against the current schedule, cost and change records, and applicable specifications and submittal dispositions. Read the report as the recipient: can the decision be made from this description, or is a drawing, option comparison, estimate, or site review missing? Add that missing input and assign a person to provide it.

Retain the issued report as a dated snapshot. Continue work in the live register, preserving closed decisions and the evidence reference. The accompanying change-control guide explains why an unresolved exposure should remain visible without being treated as an approved contract adjustment.

Before you issue

• Traceability: every headline has a dated source or is explicitly labeled as an estimate.
• Consistency: milestone dates and forecast amounts agree with the underlying control records.
• Authority: the named decision owner can actually decide, or the escalation path is explicit.
• Timing: the deadline allows time to implement the answer.
• Closure: completed decisions have an authorization reference, not just a green fill color.

Keep commercial amounts, personal contact details, and sensitive facility information within the distribution rules for the project. A useful report needs a clear evidence reference; it does not need every supporting document embedded in every copy.

Sources, method & limitations

This guide’s examples, workflow, and workbook instructions are original teaching material from Pacific Project Controls. The public references below supply background. They do not endorse this site or make this workbook an official assessment tool.

1. GAO Cost Estimating and Assessment Guide, GAO-20-195G (2020)
   Background on defining a cost baseline, documenting assumptions, and updating estimates with actual information. Our report layout, allowance example, and spreadsheet structure are original.
2. GAO Schedule Assessment Guide, GAO-16-89G (2015)
   Background on reliable schedules, their relationship to cost, and the need to assess dependencies and change. The screening checks here are a limited teaching aid, not a GAO compliance assessment.
3. U.S. Department of Energy: EVMS Implementation Guidance
   Links to the Department’s change-control guidance and describes checking data validity before interpreting performance. Federal guidance is context; its contractual requirements are not asserted to apply to every reader.
4. Federal Acquisition Regulation 52.243-4: Changes
   An example of a contract clause that recognizes certain oral directions from an authorized contracting officer, subject to written notice and other conditions. It does not establish that every verbal instruction is an approved change or that federal contract terms apply to every project.
5. AIA Contract Documents: Construction Change Directives vs. Change Orders
   Explains the distinction between agreed change orders, written change directives, and informal direction that requires documentation. The project’s actual contract documents govern authority, notice, and required forms.
6. AIA Contract Documents: contractor review of submittals
   Explains contractor coordination and review under A201–2017 before forwarding submittals to the architect. Use the actual project contract to identify review responsibilities; this reference does not make that agreement applicable to every project.
7. AIA Contract Documents: payment for materials stored offsite
   Explains A201–2017 section 9.3.2 as one contractual approach: advance owner approval for offsite storage and payment, an agreed location, protection of the owner’s interest, and applicable insurance and transport arrangements. The executed project contract governs eligibility.
8. AIA Contract Documents: payment applications and stored-material reconciliation
   Describes required payment support and moving stored value to completed work as incorporation occurs without charging for the same material twice. Use the project’s actual payment rules and applicable waiver requirements.

Apply the actual project requirements and obtain the relevant professional review. This guide does not establish contractual entitlement, certify technical performance, or replace authorized acceptance. No actual client record or project outcome is represented by the fictional examples.

Release edition · October 21, 2026. Source notes identify the references used in preparation. Report an error or review our correction policy.