Weekly update review

Paolo,

I have different templates depending upon the target audience.
for example to check the status of tasks with team members I maintain an excel with the list of tasks, delivery dates, responsible, status, comments etc and make sure team leads are following up with their members for regular tracking and to see if there are any risks.
for senior management I will give overall picture like current stage of the project, RGB status, budget hours, actual hours, FTE,risks, highlights, lowlights etc.

Thanks to all for your advices. Anyway I would to be more detailed about my question because maybe I was a little generic.
I manage projects in a small company. The development team where I work is composed by 8 persons located pratically in one office. The weekly update review that I refer is the status update or status report of the tasks of the various projects in progress done by the development team . I don't refer to the review with the senior management or with the customer. Now I perform an 1 to 1 weekly interview of 10-15 minutes with each colleagues to collect the status of the tasks. I think that a face to face communication is more effective than an online communication in particular considering that we are pratically in the same office. Instead I introduced the visual to do list with the budget and the actuals about one year ago because before the info were only reported in the company PM software but no one considered that and I would sensibilize the team on priority, deadline and costs.

Suhail and Rami, do you maintain the same position also after this consideration?
I'm really interested on your point of view.

Thanks for the very valuable inputs.

I'd just like to add that I tend to use a very visual and high level document when presenting a project update to the Project Sponsor or steering committee. The template includes, in a very graphic manner, milestones that have been already achieved, milestones or tasks that are being worked on as of now, milestones or tasks that shall be achieved by next project review meeting, and a mini high level risk review.

I found that management staff (MD and higher) love one-pagers, so this is what I give them. If they request further information, I am (or try) to be prepared as well.

Paolo, in this situation and considering that it is a small project with 8 employees only in the same location then I would assume communication between you and your team is an on going process on daily basis. In this case, IMHO, if you see a need for an internal meeting, do a bi-weekly meeting for all the team.

Daily interaction between you and your team is more than enough to cover your concerns and I do not see the need for 1-1 Interviews. In such situations, I would rather concentrate on keeping the staff productive than keeping them busy with meetings and interviews. Time is of Essence.

Of course it is different from one PM to another but thats how I would run the show if it was me.

Hope this helps Paolo.