I suppose you could have a trigger fire to read the project value, find the backing item ID, and then set the URL link to the item in a rich text field. This would generate a hyperlink for users on the item itself.
As for the QBR, you could set the Display Rows property to 1 row if you want, and modify the QBR to display only certain fields in the header. Double-clicking the QBR field value would open an item view for the backing item if users wanted to see more details.
