Patent ID: 8489501

Claim:
A method of evaluating financial risk associated with a project, the method comprising: establishing data access levels for participants associated with one or more projects managed by a project management computer system, wherein the project management computer system manages multiple, unrelated projects for a plurality of participants, a first participant among the plurality of participants is associated with a first project, is allowed to view and edit project data relating to the first project stored on the project management computer system, is not associated with a second project, and is not able to view project data relating to the second project stored on the computer readable memory, and a second participant among the plurality of participants is associated with the first project and a second project and is allowed to view and edit project data relating to the first project and the second project stored on the project management computer system; electronically receiving, by the project management computer system, project data from the second participant, the project data including financial information relating to the second project and information indicative of project performance relating to the second project; storing the project data to a computer readable memory in the project management computer system; processing the project data stored in the computer readable memory to generate updated project status information and budget information for the second project; storing the updated project status information and budget information to the computer readable memory; initiating, by the project management computer system, a payment to the second participant based on the project data; electronically aggregating, by the project management computer system, the project data relating to the second project with additional project data relating to the first project, the additional project data submitted to the project management computer system by one or more participants associated with the first project; evaluating financial risk associated with the first project based, at least in part, on the aggregated project data stored in the computer readable memory; and displaying financial risk assessment data for the first project on a screen accessible by the first participant while preventing the first participant from viewing the project data relating to the second project, and wherein the financial risk assessment data is based at least in part on the evaluated financial risk.