Red, yellow or green? One rule for status lights

I've sat through a lot of status meetings where the color got more airtime than the problem. One person's yellow is another person's green, and red feels like blame. So I stopped letting people pick a color and started using a rule.

The rule

• Red a problem or risk with no countermeasure yet
• Yellow a problem or risk with a countermeasure in place
• Green no problems or risks

The color answers two yes-or-no questions: is there a problem, and is someone doing something about it? Nothing to argue about.

What it looks like

Red isn't a failure. It means "we found something and don't have a plan yet," which is exactly when people who can help need to hear about it. A project that is never red is usually hiding something.

As a consultant, I've had clients who didn't want to see yellow or red on their reports. I get it. Nobody likes bad news. But leaving a problem off the report doesn't make it go away. It just puts everyone at risk, and bad news doesn't age well. There's a saying often credited to Colin Powell: bad news isn't wine, it doesn't improve with age. The rule helps here too. The color isn't my opinion, it's what the problems and countermeasures say.

"Monitoring" is not a countermeasure

A countermeasure is an action with an owner and a date. "Monitoring the situation" doesn't count, and neither does "escalated." If you can't say who will do what by when, it stays red.

Rolling up

A project takes the worst light of its tasks, and a program takes the worst light of its projects. One red task makes the whole project red. That feels harsh the first time, but it's the point: nothing gets averaged away. I also let schedule count: behind plan is yellow, past the end date is red.

Show where it's heading

I use three lights instead of one: Previous, Current and Outlook. A red heading to yellow is a very different conversation from a green heading to red.