GUIDE TO PROJECT

MANAGEMENT

Mismanaging projects consistently costs businesses

financially, and reduces their efficiency as an organization.
In this guide, we examine how project management
software can help you better control your projects with
improved project visualization, granular management
functions, and collaboration tools. We also review market
trends, and what you should consider when choosing a
project management platform.
Contents

Common Tools & Features 3

Planning 4

Tracking & Management 6

Collaboration 9

Considerations When Selecting a Product 10

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Common Tools and Features

Managing projects has grown increasingly complex over the past decade.
Because of this complexity, large projects particularly information technology
undertakings -- often finish past their due dates, over-budget, and with a lower
than predicted return on investment.

Business professionals often rely on project management software to help them

oversee multiple endeavors. Similarly, companies today can more easily mitigate
risk by identifying failing aspects of a project using time tracking software that
forecasts completion dates for each phase of the project.

In this guide, well detail common features found in

project management software and discuss how they
can help you and your business gain a competitive
edge.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Planning
Planning a project first involves finding the team members with the necessary
skills, and estimating how much resources a project will need. Additionally, its of
great benefit to both managers and their businesses if they can use historical data
from past projects to forecast a completion date, estimate return on investment,
and calculate the necessary resources.

Scheduling
Scheduling completion dates for all of the moving parts in a major project helps
managers construct a more accurate timeline. Most project management software
includes automatic alerts when due dates are approaching, or when a task is not
completed on schedule. More robust interfaces include automatic reports that
detail how close a project is to completion, based on the number of sub-tasks and
goals that have been accomplished.

Timeline visualization is becoming an increasingly popular feature in less

technical industries, with the Kanban approach particularly prominent. The
Kanban style of project management involves lean production that originated
from a logistics supply chain methodology in Japan. Put another way, Kanban
project management visualizes tasks or projects via cards on a straight line

An example of a Kanban interface, from PM software LeanKit.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

or vertical funnel, which represents the production line. This lets users see
their work, and move their tasks around, as if they were on a bulletin board or
whiteboard.

Forecasting
Forecasting usually involves extrapolating based off data from previous projects,
and can be essential in calculating the ROI of a project before major resources
have been invested. Forecasting takes into account the time spent on each task as
well as the resources required to complete each task relative to the organizations
budget constraints and revenue goals. These types of tools can also help you
predict potential risks and limitations.

Resource Allocation
Similar to forecasting, resource allocation tools help project managers visualize
where their business is investing time, energy, and materials. Being able to
quickly view the resources dedicated to a project and change them on the fly is
an invaluable tool for both planning projects and pivoting during the lifetime of
the project. Although it can be time-consuming to enter and set-up a detailed
inventory of company (and human) resources, it allows for project managers to
anticipate bottlenecks and proactively allocate resources.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Tracking and Management

Even the best laid plans will be disrupted over the
lifecycle of the project.
Implementing software that provides the proper amount of granularity and
monitoring can be a tremendous tool in keeping projects on track and improving
efficiency.

Time Tracking
As the name implies, time tracking software tracks the amount of time each
project contributor spends on their assigned tasks. Besides simply measuring
productivity, time tracking software also builds an archive of valuable data that
can help businesses forecast completion dates for similar tasks or projects in the
future. Time tracking is especially helpful when managing a team of remote or
part-time employees.

The time tracking interface of project management software Wrike.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Task Management
Task management refers to the assignment of different responsibilities to various
members of the project team. Being able to quickly determine whos contributed
to what part of the project lets managers better identify bottlenecks and stay on
top of the projects progress.

While the concept of task management is simple, the software can actually
be fairly robust. In the case of large, complex projects that span different
departments, tasks are very often interconnected or dependent. Certain software
platforms geared towards these types of undertakings will feature the ability
to assign dependencies to tasks, which helps managers determine where a
breakdown in productivity is occurring and assign the necessary resources to fix
the problem. Task dependencies are often represented through gantt charts, such
as the one below:

Other common features of task management include notes and tags. Adding
notes to a task helps keep track of specific changes to the project or provide
references for the strategy associated with each task. Adding tags to tasks
makes them easier to filter and find through the PM softwares native search
functionality.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Permission Settings
Permission settings allow a PM to decide who can view, edit, or change tasks or
sections of the project management software. A key part of managing a project
effectively lies in vetting the access of each user on the platform. Judiciously
metering out permissions also helps project managers avoid having to track down
the sources of unauthorized changes to tasks or entire phases of the project.

Budget and Expense Tracking

Although software that budgets for projects, and businesses in general, comes in
standalone versions, certain project management platforms include budgeting
functions as well as expense tracking. While budgeting software is somewhat self-
explanatory, expense tracking software can provide PMs with the added benefit
of knowing how team members accrue expenses throughout the lifespan of the
project. Similar to time tracking, expense tracking provides valuable data that can
be used to forecast future project costs.

Analysis and Report

Analysis and reporting functions let project managers view data in a form other
than gantt charts. A robust analysis tool can present metrics around productivity
in a visual fashion that makes the information easier to digest. This type of data
can be critical to making mid-project pivots. If a particular task needs additional
resources or a specific department is moving slower than others, in-depth
analysis features will help PMs rectify or leverage the situation.

An example of the visual dashboards found in GoodData.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Collaboration
Once projects are underway, keeping the moving parts connected can be the
biggest challenge. Collaboration tools help connect different departments, and
make it easier to include distributed teams. Extensive collaboration features are
more common among cloud-based software than on-premise solutions.

Document Sharing
Typically, email is the most popular way to share documents between teams.
Unfortunately, this often results in redundant communication as multiple
messages are sent about the same issue. The basic structure of email also makes
it difficult to find documents.
Software that lets team members share documents
can improve productivity and increase efficiency.
Many software platforms allow users to upload
documents to specific projects or tasks, making it easy
to locate resources.
The depth of such functionality varies from the
simplicity of a system such as Google Drive, to full-fledged wikis that house all of
a projects relevant materials. Some systems rely on message boards that team
members can use to discuss ongoing issues or communicate updates.
Comprehensive sharing solutions often feature audit trails that record the history
of each task and project. Audit trails let project managers view task progress and
investigate challenges that team members may be experiencing.

Internal Messaging
Native messaging and meeting functions strengthen communications between
team members. These features come in stand-alone versions, but can also be
found in comprehensive or all-in-one project management platforms.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Considerations When Selecting

A Product
1. Desktop vs. Cloud
Businesses today need to choose between project management software
thats installed on a specific company computers (on premise), versus software
thats hosted online by the vendors (cloud). There are unique advantages and
disadvantages for both approaches. Desktop software generally transfers large
files faster and represents a single, fixed-
Cloud-based solutions cost license. Cloud-based solutions allow
allow companies to companies to connect teams with remote
connect teams with workers and different schedules. Cloud
remote workers and products also allow mobile employees to
access the project management platform
different schedules. regardless of their location.

2. Best of Breed vs. All-In-One

Project requirements often vary as a project expands and matures. Industries
such as software development and architecture, engineering, and construction
(AEC) require highly specific functionality to fit their unique workflows. Buyers
from these fields must be especially selective when choosing a vendor. Its
always best to select software that intuitively lines up with the needs of your
organization, and industry.
Make sure to request a free demonstration (most PM companies offer one), and
consider how each of the products features will translate to your particular
projects. Simply because a platform offers a suite of features doesnt mean its the
best for your business. After all, sometimes less is more.

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 Guide to PROJECT MANAGEMENT

3. Usability and Integration

Dont just consider the particular features of each project management software.
Examine the overall usability of the platform, too. Even products with lots of
useful features can cause confusion if their interface is difficult to use, or cant be
easily understood. Youll be interacting with this program every day - make sure it
wont be a source of frustration.

Further, its important to consider the integration capacity of each project

management software. Your legacy systems already hold all of your most
important documents, so selecting a product that integrates with your email
client will avoid a complicated migration down the road.

Interested in more efficiently executing your

projects and increasing your ROI? Call us now at
877.917.7644 and one of our technology experts
will walk you through the best project management
options for your business.

Or you can visit our site, TechnologyAdvice.com for

business technology news, in-depth analysis and
proprietary market research.

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