Program health checks are essential for organizations to identify risks and issues early, complementing program audits by ensuring effective execution and smooth progress. The choice between using internal staff or external consultants for these checks is crucial, as each brings unique advantages and biases. Overall, health checks diagnose complex program issues and suggest corrective actions to prevent projects from entering distress mode.

2. Introduction:
• Organizations may view program health checks as unnecessary expenses, especially when there
are program audits that are performed and when program execution appears smooth.
• Program teams are at times focused on operational details and could fail to recognize risks and
issues. Independently done, program health checks ensure that the program is run effectively and
the progress is smooth as envisaged in the plan.
• Therefore, all critical programs should be put through a health check process. By their very
nature, these health check exercises unearth risks early.
• Taking necessary corrective action early would help organizations manage these programs better
than trying to salvage projects that run in a crisis mode.
• This paper highlights the differences between program health checks and program audits, the
factors that influence the choice between internal staff and external consultants to execute the
program health check, and the dimensions on which these assessments are done.

3. How Health Checks are different from Program Audits :
Program health checks prima facie appear similar to program audits, but these are complementary
services. The table below highlights some of the subtle nuances between the two exercises:

4. How Health Checks are different from Program Audits :

5. How Health Checks are different from Program Audits :

6. Program Health Check Execution – Internal Staff versus External
Consultant:
• Organizations need to resolve this issue upfront – whether they use existing internal staff or
engage external consultants to conduct this exercise.
• While internal staff understand the organization culture well and are acquainted with the systems
and processes for data collection, they would also have their biases and preferences.
• External consultants on the other hand can be expected to bring best practices / learning from
other engagements and a structured methodology besides a comfort factor where project
personnel can be free when expressing their views during interviews.

7. Dimensions :
The Project Management Book of Knowledge* provides a comprehensive framework for project
execution. A program / project health check should encompass addressing various domain areas
including:
• Project set up and planning
• Project scope
• Project schedule and costs
• Project resourcing
• Project communication and reporting
• Project risk management
• Stakeholders, vendors and benefits management

8. Conclusion:
Every complex program encounters problems that are seemingly out of control of the program
management team. Some of the telltale signs include schedule slippages that cannot be resolved;
increasing effort spent on issue resolution and reduced productivity. Program health checks focus
on diagnosing such problems, identifying the causes that produce seemingly unrelated problems
and suggesting remedial actions. A health check exercise executed with appropriate diligence can
help avoid projects getting into distress mode, by taking early corrective action