Understanding the primary function of controlling in management: evaluating performance and making adjustments

Controlling in management: the company’s safety net and compass rolled into one

Let me ask you a quick question. When a team hits a snag, who spots it first and what happens next? The answer, in real life work, isn’t glamorous. It’s the controlling function at work. Its primary job is to evaluate how things are going and to make adjustments so the organization stays on track toward its goals.

What is controlling, really?

Think of controlling as a steady feedback loop. It’s not about cooking up plans and hoping for the best. It’s about watching progress, measuring results, and responding when reality slips from the plan. The core activities are simple in concept, even if they take some discipline to do well:

• Monitor performance: gather data on how things are actually going. This could mean financial numbers, project progress, quality metrics, customer feedback, or employee performance.

• Compare actual to planned: look for gaps, delays, or overruns. Are we on schedule? Are we hitting cost targets? Is the quality where it should be?

• Analyze why gaps exist: ask questions, check data sources, and test assumptions. Sometimes the issue is obvious; other times it’s a hidden variance that only shows up after you dig in.

• Take corrective action: decide what to change—adjust a process, reallocate resources, tweak timelines, or revise standards—and then implement it.

• Reassess and repeat: monitoring isn’t a one-off thing. It’s ongoing, a rhythm that keeps the organization honest about progress and performance.

In the NCCM world, this function isn’t an afterthought. It’s a continuous practice that helps managers keep projects, departments, and even entire programs moving in the right direction. The certification emphasis you’ll encounter here stresses the capacity to measure, interpret, and act—not just to dream up plans and leave them on a shelf.

Planning, organizing, and controlling: how they play together

If you’ve studied management theory, you’ve probably heard about the big three functions: planning, organizing, and controlling. It’s tempting to lump them together as a single workflow, but they’re distinct steps in a longer chain.

• Planning is where you set goals and design a path to reach them. Think budgets, schedules, staffing plans, and marketing roadmaps.

• Organizing is about assembling the right people, processes, and resources to execute that plan. It’s the structure you build to support action.

• Controlling is the feedback loop that keeps the plan honest. It’s where you verify progress and correct course as needed.

So, while budgeting, hiring, or drafting a marketing plan are essential, they fall into planning and organizing. Controlling sits at the end of that loop, continuously asking, “Are we delivering as expected, and if not, what needs to change?”

A practical read on controlling

Let’s translate that into something you can picture on a busy day:

• You start with a KPI dashboard. It could be a simple set of numbers: cost variance, schedule variance, or quality defect rate. The dashboard is your control panel.

• You review actuals against targets. If costs are higher than planned, you ask why. If completion is behind schedule, you look for bottlenecks.

• You dig a little deeper. The data tells you something happened—perhaps a supplier delay or a defect spike in a subassembly. You don’t stop at the surface; you chase the root cause.

• You act. Maybe you accelerate some tasks, reallocate staff, or adjust a process to prevent repeat slips. Then you set a revised target and watch closely.

• You repeat. The cycle becomes familiar: measure, compare, adjust, measure again.

In this frame, controlling is less about policing people and more about preserving momentum. It’s about keeping operations aligned with the bigger picture, without letting small deviations snowball into real trouble.

A few concrete tools and ideas you’ll encounter in NCCM practice

If you’ve ever used dashboards, you know the power of a clear picture. In controlling, a few familiar tools keep you honest and actionable:

• Key Performance Indicators (KPIs): these are the vital signs. They should be clear, measurable, and timely. Think cost variance (CV), schedule variance (SV), defect rate, or on-time delivery.

• Variance analysis: a formal way to compare what happened with what was planned. It helps you quantify the gap and prioritize what to fix.

• Corrective action plans: a short, practical roadmap for what you’ll do differently. It’s not a dissertation; it’s a concrete set of steps, owners, and deadlines.

• Performance dashboards: visual summaries that distill a lot of data into something you can read at a glance. They’re not decoration—they’re decision aids.

• Regular reviews and feedback loops: scheduled checkpoints where leaders ask, “What’s working? What isn’t?” and commit to changes.

In the NCCM sphere, you’ll also see a focus on project controls, risk management, and governance. Controlling isn’t just about numbers; it’s about ensuring processes stay reliable, quality stays high, and projects don’t drift off course.

A quick metaphor to seal the idea

Imagine you’re steering a sailboat. Planning is choosing the route, organizing is assembling the crew and the sails, and controlling is watching the wind and tide while adjusting the sails to keep you on course. If you ignore the weather, you might miss a forecast and end up off track. If you overcorrect every gust, you’ll waste energy and reset course too often. The best captains find the balance: they read the sea, respond calmly, and keep moving toward the goal.

Common pitfalls—and how to sidestep them

Controlling sounds straightforward, but in practice it’s easy to trip up. A few patterns to watch for:

• Focusing on vanity metrics: don’t chase numbers that look good but don’t reflect real progress. Keep it tight to what actually moves outcomes.

• Delayed action: the longer you wait to address a variance, the bigger the problem becomes. Timely adjustments beat late corrections.

• Data for data’s sake: if your data isn’t clean or timely, you’re chasing noise. Invest in reliable data sources and routines.

• Overcorrecting: frequent, dramatic changes can destabilize teams. Small, purposeful adjustments often work best.

• Siloed reporting: when departments don’t share data, the picture isn’t complete. Cross-functional visibility makes for smarter decisions.

A few practical tips to keep your control function healthy

• Start with a few essential metrics. Pick 3–5 indicators that truly reflect performance and are easy to track weekly.

• Make the corrective action plan concrete. Names, dates, and owners matter as much as numbers.

• Build a simple rhythm. A regular review cadence—weekly dashboards, monthly deep-dives—helps everyone stay aligned without feeling micromanaged.

• Teach data literacy. If more team members understand the numbers, you’ll get faster, better decisions.

• Celebrate clear wins. When a corrective action works, call it out. It reinforces good habits and motivates the team.

Why this matters in a certification context

In the NCCM certification world, the controlling function isn’t just a box to check. It’s a backbone of credible management. You’re signaling that you can translate data into action, that you can keep complexity under control, and that you understand how to shepherd a project or program back to its intended course. The ability to monitor, interpret, and adjust is what separates good managers from great ones.

A small digression that still stays on track

Sometimes people wonder if controlling means “watching over people” or “policing every move.” Not at all. It’s about building trust through transparency. When teams see clear metrics, know what good looks like, and have a simple plan to fix problems, they feel empowered rather than micromanaged. The goal is a culture where data informs decisions, not a culture where data points punish people. And yes, a calm, data-driven culture can feel oddly uplifting on even the busiest days.

Bringing it all together

So, what’s the primary function of controlling in management? It’s evaluating performance and making adjustments. It’s the ongoing measurement-and-response loop that keeps daily work connected to strategic aims. It isn’t flashy, but it’s essential. It’s the mechanism that helps departments stay in sync, projects stay on track, and programs deliver results.

If you’re stepping into the NCCM certification landscape, think of controlling as your practical compass. You’ll learn to set up the right dashboards, pick meaningful indicators, and turn data into action. You’ll see that managing isn’t about guessing the future; it’s about catching deviations early and steering toward the goal with clarity and steadiness.

A final thought to take with you: performance isn’t a one-time target. It’s a moving target, a living rhythm. When you cultivate a disciplined yet flexible approach to monitoring and adjusting, you’ll find that progress compounds. The work isn’t finished when you set a plan—it’s finished when you shape the reality you set out to achieve.

If you’re curious, that balance—watchful monitoring paired with timely, thoughtful action—often becomes your most reliable compass in the NCCM journey. And that, in practice, makes a world of difference.