AI prompts for construction project status reports

Click any highlighted blank to fill it in before you copy.

You are writing a weekly construction project status report for
an internal delivery team. Your job is to surface variance and
decisions, not to reassure.

Project: {{name, contract value, contract type}}
Reporting week: {{dates}}
Programme: {{planned milestones this period and their dates}}
Actual: {{what completed, what did not, with dates}}
Days lost this period and cumulatively: {{figures, with cause}}
Cost: {{committed to date, forecast final, budget, variance}}
Variations: {{raised, agreed, disputed — with values and status}}
Labour and plant: {{planned vs actual resource on site}}
Procurement: {{long-lead items, order dates, delivery dates,
  anything slipping}}
Information required: {{outstanding RFIs and drawings, who owes
  them, how long overdue}}
Safety: {{incidents, near misses, inspections}}
Quality: {{NCRs, snags raised and closed}}
Weather or access: {{days lost, restrictions}}
Risks: {{each with likelihood, impact in days and pounds}}
Decisions needed: {{each with owner and the date by which it
  must be made}}

Click any highlighted blank to fill it in before you copy.

Write the report in this order. Length limit: 500 words.

1. DECISIONS NEEDED THIS WEEK — first, before any narrative.
   Each as: the decision, the owner, the date it is needed by,
   and the cost of deciding late. If there are none, say so
   explicitly.
2. VARIANCE — programme in days (this period and cumulative)
   and cost against budget, as figures. One line each.
3. WHY — the cause of each variance, at one level deeper than
   the symptom. Name the upstream dependency.
4. CHANGED SINCE LAST WEEK — only what is different.
5. LOOKING AHEAD — the next three milestones and the single
   biggest threat to each.
6. SAFETY AND QUALITY — factual, no commentary.

Rules:
- Never use a RAG colour without the number behind it.
- Every risk must have an impact in both days and pounds. If
  the input lacks one, write [QUANTIFY: what is needed].
- Every issue must have an owner who is a person, not a
  company or a team.
- Do not describe activity for its own sake. If a task
  progressed exactly to programme, it does not need a sentence.
- No mitigating language: remove "slight", "minor", "should be
  recovered", "expected to catch up" unless the input contains
  a specific recovery plan with dates.
- If the cumulative delay exceeds the float, say so in the
  first line of section 2.

Click any highlighted blank to fill it in before you copy.

You are writing a client-facing status report for
{{project}}, reporting period {{dates}}.

Internal report: {{paste}}
What the client controls: {{decisions, approvals, information,
  access, payments}}
What we control: {{our scope}}
Contractual notice position: {{any events requiring notice,
  and whether notice has been served}}
Commercially sensitive: {{what must not appear}}

Write for a client who is not a builder. Include:
1. WHAT WE NEED FROM YOU — their outstanding decisions,
   approvals and information, each with a date and the
   consequence of missing it. This goes first.
2. WHERE THE PROJECT IS — completion date, whether it has
   moved, and by how much. State the date, not a percentage.
3. COST POSITION — agreed variations, pending variations, and
   forecast out-turn against budget.
4. WHAT HAPPENED THIS PERIOD — brief.
5. WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.

Rules:
- Do not use programme jargon: no float, no critical path
  without explanation, no RFI without expansion.
- Never attribute delay to the client in section 4. State it
  factually in section 1 as an outstanding item with a date.
- If a delay event requires contractual notice and notice has
  not been served, flag it to the writer before the report:
  NOTICE REQUIRED: {{event}}. Do not rely on the report itself
  as notice.
- No reassurance that is not backed by a dated recovery plan.

Click any highlighted blank to fill it in before you copy.

You are drafting a delay notification. Accuracy and
neutrality matter more than tone.

Contract and clause: {{form of contract, notice clause}}
Event: {{what happened, with the date it occurred and the date
  it became apparent}}
Cause: {{the factual cause, one level deep}}
Effect on programme: {{activities affected, days, and effect on
  completion date}}
Effect on cost: {{known and estimated, separated}}
Mitigation taken: {{what we have already done}}
Mitigation possible with instruction: {{options and costs}}
Records held: {{what evidence exists — records, photos,
  correspondence, delivery notes}}

Click any highlighted blank to fill it in before you copy.

You are a commercial manager who has seen many construction status
reports go from amber to red overnight. Read the report below
adversarially.

Output:

1. HEDGED SLIPPAGE — every phrase that describes a delay
   without quantifying it. Quote each and state what number
   is missing.
2. UNOWNED ITEMS — every issue or risk without a named
   individual and a date.
3. UNQUANTIFIED RISK — every risk without both a day and a
   cost impact.
4. ROLLED-OVER ITEMS — anything that appears in this report
   and the previous one unchanged. An item that has not moved
   in two weeks is escalating, whatever its colour says.
5. RAG MISMATCH — any status colour not supported by the
   numbers in the same report.
6. MISSING NOTICES — any described event that would normally
   require contractual notice, with no notice recorded.
7. FLOAT — whether cumulative delay has consumed the float,
   and whether the report says so.

PREVIOUS REPORT: {{paste}}
THIS REPORT: {{paste}}

Click any highlighted blank to fill it in before you copy.

You are producing this period's reports for {{n}} projects and
a one-page portfolio summary.

Reporting period: {{dates}}
Project data: {{table — the core inputs per project}}
Previous period's reports: {{paste, for delta detection}}

For each project, write the report in the established format.

Then produce a portfolio summary:
- Projects by cumulative programme variance, worst first.
- Total forecast cost variance across the portfolio.
- Every decision needed in the next 10 days across all
  projects, with owner and date, sorted by date.
- Any risk appearing on more than one project — a shared
  cause is a portfolio problem, not a project one.
- Any project whose variance has worsened for three
  consecutive periods.

Rules for the batch:
- Never carry data between projects.
- Any project missing cost variance or days lost: output
  PROJECT {{name}} INCOMPLETE — {{items}} and produce no
  report. Those two fields are the report.
- Sort the summary by severity, not alphabetically.