What to be able to hand over
A project report should explain where a commitment is at risk. Keep the reporting date fixed and show ownership, deadlines and spending using conventions the team has agreed.
- A dated status tracker
- Separate overdue unfinished work from completed work and record the owner of the next action.
- A spending review
- Compare actual cost with the approved plan and explain the sign of each variance.
- A concise stakeholder update
- Summarize exceptions, dependencies and decisions needed while retaining the underlying task list.
Build beyond this course
Project planning, risk management, stakeholder communication and delivery methods extend beyond an Excel tracker. This course does not implement critical-path scheduling or resource optimization.
Occupational context: BLS: Project management specialists. The handover examples above are our practice suggestions.
Work to practise
- Separate unfinished late work from completed deliverables.
- Count calendar days using an explicit date.
- Show spending exceptions alongside schedule status.
All examples use original synthetic data. Source row numbers and column letters are shown so you can reproduce the formulas.
Review six deliverables on 10 November 2026
Count unfinished deliverables due before the as-of date. Calculate elapsed calendar days for the oldest open item and total expense variance.
November 2026 day numbers; USD. All six dates are in the same stated month.
| Row | A · Task | B · Due day in Nov 2026 | C · Status | D · Plan USD | E · Actual USD | F · Due before day 10 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | Brief | 3 | Done | 120 | 100 | Yes |
| 3 | Prototype | 6 | Open | 300 | 340 | Yes |
| 4 | Review | 10 | Open | 80 | 80 | No |
| 5 | 12 | Open | 200 | 180 | No | |
| 6 | Invite | 8 | Done | 50 | 50 | Yes |
| 7 | Access check | 9 | Open | 100 | 115 | Yes |
Worked solution and complete results
Overdue unfinished · H2
=COUNTIFS(C2:C7,"Open",B2:B7,"<10")Result: 2
Prototype overdue calendar days · H3
=DAYS(DATE(2026,11,10),DATE(2026,11,6))Result: 4
Expense variance USD · H4
=SUM(E2:E7)-SUM(D2:D7)Result: 15
A mistake to catch
Counting every due date before day 10 includes completed Brief and Invite. Counting due-on-day-10 as overdue changes the agreed rule.
Correction. Require Open and due day less than 10. Use a fixed DATE value rather than an unstated moving date.
Read the result
Prototype and Access check are late and unfinished under this convention. Overall recorded spending exceeds plan by USD 15. Calendar days include weekends and do not measure working-day delay.
Practise the skills in order
- DATE Read the guide, then open the actual lesson.
- DAYS Read the guide, then open the actual lesson.
- COUNTIFS Read the guide, then open the actual lesson.
- Actual versus target Read the guide, then open the actual lesson.
- Filter Read the guide, then open the actual lesson.
- Column and line charts Read the guide, then open the actual lesson.
The day-number shortcut here applies only within this one month. Use real date cells across months. NETWORKDAYS, critical-path scheduling and resource optimization are outside the supported subset.
Practice elapsed daysPay and remote work
U.S. pay reference
- Published occupation
- Project management specialists
- Median annual wage
- USD 102,320
- Location and period
- United States · May 2025
This specialist occupation is the reference. Project coordinator, construction manager and senior program manager titles can involve different duties and pay.
These BLS figures cover employees across work arrangements. They are not a remote-only salary, an entry-level offer or an earnings outcome from this course. Median means half earn more and half earn less.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook. Reviewed . Values are U.S. dollars; no currency conversion is applied.
Read a remote posting carefully
For distributed projects, ask how decisions, time zones and handovers are managed. Confirm whether the role includes client-site meetings or delivery activities tied to a physical location.
Check the allowed country or state, working hours, employment or contractor status, and the currency and components of the offer. A remote role can still have location restrictions and locally set pay.
One employer example: GitLab’s candidate handbook says to check each listing’s hiring country. Its current compensation policy uses local market data and local-currency ranges. This is an illustration of employer policy, not a claim about every remote job.
Continue in a downloadable workbook
Budget variance practice
Explain signed expense variance, overspend and percentage variance without hiding a zero budget.
USD for a fictional November 2026 workshop. Variance = actual minus plan; positive means expense over budget.
Bank version 2026-11-02. Includes Instructions, Practice, AnswerKey; 14 live answer formulas. All source records are invented for education.
The download is an additional practice task. Its Instructions sheet identifies the source coordinates; this page’s illustrative example may use different records.
- Working answers use scalar Excel 2007+ functions. No macros, external links or dynamic-array dependency. Native Excel has not been launched for verification.