Tuesday Brief: Modern programs have outgrown the Work Breakdown Structure. While the WBS has served project management for over 50 years, today's multi-dimensional contracts with multiple CLINs, funding streams, and reporting requirements strain a structure designed for simpler times. This creates bloated control accounts, fractured accountability, and forces project managers to invent workarounds for basic integration visibility. This week we examine why the traditional WBS creates these problems and how the Integration Relationship Diagramming Method (IRDM) offers a systematic solution.
November 4, 2025
In This Issue:
Featured Article: Beyond the WBS - The Integration Relationship Diagramming Method redefines program integration
Video Tutorial: Display the WBS in Resource Usage View - Dale Howard's workaround reveals a structural limitation
Live Event (11/5): Project controls expert Jeff Christoph introduces IRDM
PM Best Practice: Control accounts should enable control, not consume it
Photo: transformativems.blog
Featured Article: Beyond the WBS - The Integration Relationship Diagramming Method (IRDM) Redefines How Programs Integrate
For more than half a century, the Work Breakdown Structure has been the foundation of program organization and project controls. But modern programs have outgrown it. When teams try to "integrate everything into the WBS" by embedding Contract Line Items, phases, or cost elements directly into the hierarchy, they multiply control accounts exponentially, creating overhead that erodes control rather than improving it.
Project controls expert Jeff Christoph introduces IRDM, a four-step framework that separates structure from integration using metadata rather than hierarchy. Instead of forcing every visibility requirement into the WBS, IRDM defines four independent structural domains: Common, Contract, Accounting, and Program-Specific. Integration becomes explicit, scalable, and reversible while the WBS remains clean and control accounts stay lean.
What you'll learn:
Why industry guidance on WBS integration is contradictory and confusing
How hybrid WBS approaches multiply control accounts by 300%+
The four structural domains that make multidimensional integration work
Real-world proof from an $800M DoD program that passed DCMA EVMS compliance on first attempt
Video Tutorial: Display the WBS in Resource Usage View
Microsoft Project MVP Dale Howard demonstrates a common frustration: you can see resources and their task assignments, but you can't see where those tasks fit in your project's work breakdown structure. His solution? A grouping trick using "Assignments Keeping Outline Structure."
But here's the question this workaround raises: Why do we need tricks to see fundamental project information? The fact that resources and WBS structure require elaborate workarounds to view together points to exactly what Jeff Christoph addresses in this week's featured article. The two-dimensional WBS simply wasn't designed to handle today's multi-dimensional program integration needs.
What Dale covers:
The missing feature in Resource Usage View that frustrates project managers
The built-in group that displays summary tasks with resource assignments
Why this workaround is necessary (and what that tells us about structural limitations)
Live Event (11/5): Beyond the WBS - The Integration Relationship Diagramming Method (IRDM)
Join project controls expert Jeff Christoph for a deep dive into the Integration Relationship Diagramming Method. You'll see exactly how IRDM eliminates bloated control accounts, reduces process cost, and restores management control while improving compliance and visibility.
Through real-world examples from an $800M DoD program, Jeff will demonstrate how to design program integration using four independent structural domains and metadata-driven relationships. This isn't theory. It's a proven, standards-aligned method for structuring complex programs without breaking the WBS.
MPUG host live events with leading experts on Wednesdays from 12:00pm - 1:00pm ET! MPUG members get access to live events where you get direct access to industry leaders, actionable insights, hands-on training, and opportunities to earn PDU's.
Learn more and register for upcoming events:
11/5: Beyond the WBS: The Integration Relationship Diagramming Method (IRDM) | Learn More / Register Here
PM Best Practice: Let Control Accounts Serve Their Purpose
Every unnecessary control account brings an entire chain of management effort: unique baselines, separate work authorizations, variance analysis, and audit trails. When you multiply control accounts to gain visibility into CLINs or phases, you're not increasing control. You're diluting it. True integration happens at the work package level through metadata, not through structural layering. Keep your control accounts lean and focused on actual management authority, and push integration complexity down where it belongs.
