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116 • Green Project Management

unlikely that there will be much historical data to review or benchmarks
to compare. As the field of green project management matures, that type
of data—and improved tools to handle them—will surely become more
readily available.
The GA of the project’s product can be assessed by comparing the prod-
uct’s green functionality at the various waypoints of the project.
Thinking of the hiking analogy of this part of the book, we can imag-
ine a hiker using a handheld global positioning system (GPS) with pro-
grammed waypoints and checking progress along the way as he or she
hikes through the project. In this way, it will be easy to check on the
success of the hike by comparing progress against the waypoints as
well as reconciling supplies and health status as the hiker moves along.
Assessing the greenality of the project is relatively the same. At each of
the project’s milestones set during the planning process, the project man-
ager can assess whether or not the project has reached that point and
whether or not it is healthy (on time, in scope, with greenality, and within
budget). However, assessing the project’s process greenality may not be as
easy, because the focus will be on the other, more traditional project con-
straints of scope, time, and budget. As we’ve said before, greenality is just
as important as any other project constraint, and in fact should already
be included in the scope. Because it is a new concept it will be easy to
lose focus, and that would be a mistake, as greenality can affect the proj-
ect’s success just as would going over budget or being behind schedule.
Without the vigilance of GA, it will be easy to miss the signs that could
adversely affect the project.

traCking ProjeCt ProCess

In addition to the GA process, there are other, complementary processes
that need to be considered. The method to generate the data should have
been defined during the planning stage of the project. It is now time to
generate data showing that, relative to time, cost, scope, and other proj-
ect constraints, the project components are being effectively managed.
Standard methodology applies to project tracking. The greenality com-
ponent of the project is one of the many project components that need to
be tracked on a regular basis, and should be included as such. No distinc-
tion needs to be made, or should be made, between tracking a greenality