Project Reports 🙈

Hey there,

It’s Robin from CFD Engine & I found a huge hole in my CFD process this week. A gap that’s responsible for hours of manual work & that I was blind to after years of CFDing.

Much worse than de-featuring CAD or fixing bad cells, as unavoidable as death & taxes, I’m talking about everyone’s favourite task – writing the end-of-project report 🥶

In my case it’s almost always a custom thing, the CFD bit might be identical to a previous project, but different clients need different things, explained in different ways.

Sometimes I’ll get away with an email summary & a results spreadsheet, but more often than not it’s big report time.

And it is definitely not automatic.

I haven’t got any magic solutions for this, but I thought I’d tell you what I do, so you can tell me a better way 🙏

For context, my old project reports used to look like a high-school science paper or something from a third-rate journal.

But things have changed a bit since then…

What changed…

Documentary

I’ve tried to evolve my reports into a documentary style.

A record of why we did things, along with the key results that supported those decisions. As opposed to including every single run, in the same level of detail, to try & justify the invoice.

Hopefully it’s now a document that will make sense in 12-18 months, when everyone has forgotten what they decided & why.

Digital First

I ditched the idea that it was primarily a printed document & made it look good on screen (it can still be printed, it’s in a landscape presentation format).

I increased the amount of images I use – showing important geometric & flow details, rather than trying to describe them. I’ve even started drawing on it (with a stylus) to illustrate/highlight the exact areas I’m talking about.

Rolling Report

Lastly, I shifted from a final report (delivered/presented at the end of the project) to a rolling report that’s always available (via Dropbox or similar). It starts small, just a handful of pages at the outset & grows with the project. It’s great to have on-hand in meetings & for ensuring we’re all literally on the same page.

I probably spend longer on the report this way 🤦‍♂️ However, lots of 20min chunks, spread across the whole project, feels easier than an entire week of writing up.

What didn’t change

Although not part of the report, I still supply copious amounts of standardised post-processing for each simulation, just in case someone wants to dig in 🤓

What might change

The end-of-project report (in some format or another) is here to stay (for now). I’m not going to fight it, but I wonder if there are a couple more changes I could make 🤔

Collaboration

Whilst I make the report available throughout the project, there isn’t much collaboration on the actual document. I write it & I upload it. It might be nice if some collaboration or discussion could take place within (and be recorded in) the document itself.

Maybe Google Slides could work for this?

Non-Linear

My projects are typically non-linear, we branch off to look at interesting stuff, circle back to build on a previous result & combine branches to generate new insights. That’s hard to express in a linear report format.

Perhaps a digital whiteboard might help with this (and also allow for collaboration)? Tools like Miro & FigJam could be good, although I’m not sure I’m brave enough to propose them to a client (yet).

Thoughts?

Have you cracked the recipe for a painless end-of-project report? I can imagine some workflows where they’re completely automated 🙏 but I also know places where it’s like writing an MSc dissertation every time.

What’s your process like? Do you have much scope to change your reports or is it tightly controlled? Which bits of your report do you find the most useful & can I steal them?

Is there a killer-app which makes it all easier?

Let me know your tips & tricks (or your worst report-writing experiences) & I’ll celebrate/commiserate with you as appropriate.

Until next week, stay safe,