Earned Value Analysis
Project managers are constantly looking for methods or tools that will provide specific, timely, and accurate project information to support their decisions. Earned value is one of the methods for gathering such information and monitoring a project's performance. It serves as an indicator of project status, and helps determine the project's progress. The term itself refers to a specific measurement, the budgeted cost of work performed.
Earned value analysis is the process of comparing, in terms of earned value, the project's actual performance against its planned performance. It can be calculated in hours or in dollars, and it can be calculated cumulatively or used to measure subprojects individually.