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Digg it UP - Project Management Success with the Top 7 Best Practices
The inability to delegate is one of the most common problems of managers. Management and leadership is all about getting results by organising and supervising a workforce. Poor delegation or no delegation is inefficient and expensive. And the worst thing about not delegating is that managers are losing wonderful training opportunities for their workers.Managers have many reasons for not delegating: They feel at ease doing routine tasks rather than supervising the work of others They aren't familiar with the skills of their workers and therefore unsure of other people's ability to take more responsibility They hate correcting other people's work They know they can do some things better than others
Communication
Project plans are useless unless they've been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn't shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assig
Are you a homeowner or a business owner who owns a home or a business in or around the Dallas area? If so, are you looking to have your home or office carpets cleaned? If you are, you may be looking to hire the services of a Dallas carpet cleaning company. When it comes to doing so, do you know how to find carpet cleaning companies in or around your area? If you are looking for more information on how to do so, you are urged to read on.When it comes to finding a Dallas carpet cleaning company, there are a number of different steps that you could take. Before examining those steps, it is important that you remember that Dallas carpet cleaning can come in a number of different formats. For instance, there are a number of Dallas carpet cleanin
Define the scope and objectives
Firstly, understand the project objectives. Suppose your boss asks you to organise a blood donor campaign, is the objective to get as much blood donated as possible? Or, is it to raise the local company profile? Deciding the real objectives will help you plan the project.
Scope defines the boundary of the project. Is the organisation of transport to take staff to the blood bank within scope? Or, should staff make their own way there? Deciding what's in or out of scope will determine the amount of work which needs performing.
Understand who the stakeholders are, what they expect to be delivered and enlist their support. Once you've defined the scope and objectives, get the stakeholders to review and agree to them.
Define the deliverables
You must define what will be delivered by the project. If your project is an advertising campaign for a new chocolate bar, then one deliverable might be the artwork for an advertisement. So, decide what tangible things will be delivered and document them in enough detail to enable someone else to produce them correctly and effectively.
Key stakeholders must review the definition of deliverables and must agree they accurately reflect what must be delivered.
Project planning
Planning requires that the project manager decides which people, resources and budget are required to complete the project.
You must define what activities are required to produce the deliverables using techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures. You must estimate the time and effort required for each activity, dependencies between activities and decide a realistic schedule to complete them. Involve the project team in estimating how long activities will take. Set milestones which indicate critical dates during the project. Write this into the project plan. Get the key stakeholders to review and agree to the plan.
Communication
Project plans are useless unless they've been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn't shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assign
Branding is a big buzzword in corporate marketing. Creating a distinct identity for your company in the marketplace is about more than getting the word out about your products or services. At its best, branding includes getting consumers to feel good about who you are as a company.One way big-name corporations seek to garner consumer goodwill is by linking their brand to a philanthropic cause. Consider these companies: Home Depot promotes volunteerism and supports community projects such as refurbishing playgrounds and community centers Wal-Mart supports numerous community programs, from literacy councils to youth causes. Wal-Mart has a core value of giving back to the community Lee Jeans promotes Lee National Denim Day,
Scope defines the boundary of the project. Is the organisation of transport to take staff to the blood bank within scope? Or, should staff make their own way there? Deciding what's in or out of scope will determine the amount of work which needs performing.
Understand who the stakeholders are, what they expect to be delivered and enlist their support. Once you've defined the scope and objectives, get the stakeholders to review and agree to them.
Define the deliverables
You must define what will be delivered by the project. If your project is an advertising campaign for a new chocolate bar, then one deliverable might be the artwork for an advertisement. So, decide what tangible things will be delivered and document them in enough detail to enable someone else to produce them correctly and effectively.
Key stakeholders must review the definition of deliverables and must agree they accurately reflect what must be delivered.
Project planning
Planning requires that the project manager decides which people, resources and budget are required to complete the project.
You must define what activities are required to produce the deliverables using techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures. You must estimate the time and effort required for each activity, dependencies between activities and decide a realistic schedule to complete them. Involve the project team in estimating how long activities will take. Set milestones which indicate critical dates during the project. Write this into the project plan. Get the key stakeholders to review and agree to the plan.
Communication
Project plans are useless unless they've been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn't shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assig
You have your corporate ID package, a website and are doing search engine advertising using ReachLocal.com. You have an excellent PR program in place that includes an nTarget.com-based email newsletter, guest speaking and media relations. And, you are working feverishly to retain the customers you have. You are, right?Then, it is time to ramp up the marketing noise with advertising. From Professor Hoover's Advertising 101 file, here are a few things you need to ask before you launch that ad campaign.What can I tell prospects that would interest them? Consumers don't care that you are the largest or the best. That's budget-wasting chest-thumping on the advertiser's part. In fact, most of them aren't even paying attention to advertising ab
You must define what will be delivered by the project. If your project is an advertising campaign for a new chocolate bar, then one deliverable might be the artwork for an advertisement. So, decide what tangible things will be delivered and document them in enough detail to enable someone else to produce them correctly and effectively.
Key stakeholders must review the definition of deliverables and must agree they accurately reflect what must be delivered.
Project planning
Planning requires that the project manager decides which people, resources and budget are required to complete the project.
You must define what activities are required to produce the deliverables using techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures. You must estimate the time and effort required for each activity, dependencies between activities and decide a realistic schedule to complete them. Involve the project team in estimating how long activities will take. Set milestones which indicate critical dates during the project. Write this into the project plan. Get the key stakeholders to review and agree to the plan.
Communication
Project plans are useless unless they've been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn't shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assig
As many of you who know me will know I like to keep things simple rather than overcomplicate or dither on irrelevencies. I attended a session on customer service the other week, now, a lot of it was good common sense, the usual stuff be polite etc. etc. But I felt that the same message was repeated time and time again.I always start a customer service session with the words "A gentle answer turns away wrath" Of course its not that simple but think about it. If one aggressive state i.e. the customer and another aggressive state i.e a customer services representative collide, add them together and you've got one big aggressive feeling in the room. And whats more they will fuel each other. In many cases aggression needs to be fueled by somethi
You must define what activities are required to produce the deliverables using techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures. You must estimate the time and effort required for each activity, dependencies between activities and decide a realistic schedule to complete them. Involve the project team in estimating how long activities will take. Set milestones which indicate critical dates during the project. Write this into the project plan. Get the key stakeholders to review and agree to the plan.
Communication
Project plans are useless unless they've been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn't shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assig
Winning market share is vital to your company's success. But let me tell you that winning market share is not the only thing, you must also have good customer service in order to keep those customers.Many companies will win market share by using heavy discounting strategies or introducing new products and this is great for them, but in the end the competition will catch up and without great customer service these customers will indeed migrate over to your competition. Once they do this if your competition has great customer service chances are you will not get a second chance.What does this mean to your company? Well it means that customer service is paramount and you need to take a good hard look at how your company is treating its custo
Communication
Project plans are useless unless they've been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn't shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assigned by the project manager.
Tracking and reporting project progress
Once your project is underway you must monitor and compare the actual progress with the planned progress. You will need progress reports from project team members. You should record variations between the actual and planned cost, schedule and scope. You should report variations to your manager and key stakeholders and take corrective actions if variations get too large.
You can adjust the plan in many ways to get the project back on track but you will always end up juggling cost, scope and schedule. If the project manager changes one of these, then one or both of the other elements will inevitably need changing. It is juggling these three elements - known as the project triangle - that typically causes a project manager the most headaches!
Change management
Stakeholders often change their mind about what must be delivered. Sometimes the business environment changes after the project starts, so assumptions made at the beginning of the project may no longer be valid. This often means the scope or deliverables of the project need changing. If a project manager accepted all changes into the project, the project would inevitably go over budget, be late and might never be completed.
By managing changes, the project manager can make decisions about whether or not to incorporate the changes immediately or in the future, or to reject them. This increases the chances of project success because the project manager controls how the changes are incorporated, can allocate resources accordingly and can plan when and how the changes are made. Not managing changes effectively is often a reason why projects fail.
Risk management
Risks are events which can adversely affect the successful outcome of the project. I've worked on projects where risks have included: staff lacking the technical skills to perform the work, hardware not being delivered on time, the control room at risk of flooding and many others. Risks will vary for each project but the main risks to a project must be identified as soon as possible. Plans must be made to avoid the risk, or, if the risk cannot be avoided, to mitigate the risk to lessen its
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