Project Management Tips

Before discussing Project Management Tips, let’s see clearly what Project Management is. Project Management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to a broad range of activities to meet the requirements of the particular project. Project Management knowledge and practices are best described in terms of their component processes. These processes can be placed into five process groups (initiating, planning, executing, controlling and closing) and nine knowledge areas (project integration management, project scope management, project time management, project cost management, project quality management, project human resource management, project communications management, project risk management and project procurement management).

The first of the Project Management Tips for clients are when they implement any type of project management or planning software is to not rely on the software as if it is a real person.

Most common Project Management Tips That Work:

• Justify the project by building a strong documented business case.
• Understand the key business drivers of your business.
• Get buy-in and support from top management; i.e., make sure to have a strong sponsor.
• Be specific about requirements and state them in a way that makes it easy for vendors to respond and think along with you.
• Avoid reliance on new, unproven technology.
• Ensure the vendors can meet their commitments.
• Ensure your organization can meet your own commitments.
• Clearly communicate project team roles and responsibilities.
• Give the team the budget, tools and space they need to get the work done.
• Send designated key users or team members for training as soon as possible.
• Develop a formal project plan.
• Require the project team to provide the task estimates in order to ensure buy-in to the plan.
• Let the plan be driven by specifically defined deliverables which in turn should drive the activities and tasks.
• Be objective and realistic when making estimates and setting time targets.
• Limit task duration to about two weeks (or 80 hours) or define an interim deliverable.
• Do a risk assessment and develop a contingency plan with mitigating actions.
• Provide skilled project management resources for the project team.
• Stay with the plan.
• Have regular and formal project team meetings with agendas and minutes distributed to the team.
• Track and report progress by the deliverables identified in the plan.
• Keep a formal issue log for all the practical issues that crop up and which were not included in the plan.
• Meet regularly with your sponsor.
• Require a formal change procedure to change scope and get sign-off by sponsor.
• Adjust remaining duration and cost estimates when scope changes are approved or when you must accept a delay.
• Have the users do all testing where possible.
• Define what it means to be done; i.e., for milestones, project phases or stages and for going live.
• Watch for signs of burnout and be prepared for turnover of team members (including vendor personnel).
• Start data conversion as early as possible with a representative data dump from the old system for checking of data quality.
• Build a project culture based on mission oriented directives where team members take responsibility for assigned deliverables, but figure out how to do it on their own.
• Micro manage incidental or temporary project resources because these people seldom really become part of the team.

Although, there are many Project Management Tips, depending upon author to author and organization to organization, but when it comes to most elaborated steps and Tips then following are the IT Project Management Tips.

• Evaluate Project Feasibility: Too often, haste to gain approval and begin a project may cause management to give minimal attention to this step, leading to unexpected problems in implementation, substantial cost and time overruns, and the tarnishing of the implementing department's reputation. Requiring that a thorough project-feasibility assessment and informed-consent process be performed for all IT projects may slow the approval process, but it will help avert project failure later.

• Clearly Define the Project Objectives and Scope: Before initiating an IT project, the proposed timeline, cost and quality objectives, scope, and deliverables should be clearly defined and accepted by all potential participants. Failure to verify that all stakeholders agree to these basic project parameters can lead to confusion, wasted effort, needless duplication, and ultimately, project failure.

• Single Accountability: Reporting to large steering committees does not foster personal accountability among project participants. A clearly identified executive sponsor should be responsible for the success of the overall project implementation. The sponsor should be charged with monitoring progress constantly and resolving issues that impede progress. This person should be supported by a steering committee that provides oversight and serves as a forum for communications and problem solving.

• Full-Time Project Manager Appointment: One individual should oversee the day-to-day management, execution, and delivery of the project. The project manager should track progress and report results to the project sponsor. The appropriate candidate for this position should have broad experience with similar projects and should utilize well-tested processes and tools.

• Establish A Real Project-Management Team: A project-management team should be formed as soon as the project sponsor is authorized to proceed. Although team membership will vary according to the specific project, the team should include interdisciplinary senior staff with sufficient analytical, technical, and project-related expertise to guide the project to completion.

• Creating A Detailed Project Plan: A comprehensive project plan should be developed as a guide to all major activities (i.e. estimated timeframe to complete the task), project deliverables, rollout timing, roles of team members, key risks, interdependencies, and approval processes. The plan document should incorporate all formal, written agreements with external suppliers, internal suppliers, resource owners and end-users regarding their roles in the project.

• Committed Staff Resources: The project manager should obtain formal, written commitments from department managers to allocate time for their staff to work on the project. Similar commitments regarding time and specific deliverables should be obtained from all assigned staff The need for such commitments should be sanctioned by executive leadership, thereby giving the project manager authority to demand that commitments be met. Managers will need to plan ahead to free up designated staff and secure additional staff resources as necessary to meet daily operational requirements.

• Get Commitments From Vendors And Suppliers: The project manager should be responsible for obtaining contractual commitments from all vendors and suppliers whose performance is required to complete the project and for monitoring vendor compliance with such commitments.

• Division Into Manageable Segments: Complex projects can be simplified by separating them into clearly defined segments and assigning each to an individual or small group of team members for completion within a designated time frame. The segments should be easily combinable when finished.

• Clear Performance Measurement and Report Progress Regularly: To assess project performance, a specific set of performance indicators should be identified. Useful measures that should be continuously monitored are achievement of milestones by target dates and accomplishment of tasks in accordance with defined expectations.

• Take Decisive, Corrective Action ASAP: Resolve any performance variances quickly and decisively When project performance deviates substantially from the plan, the factor causing the problem should be quickly identified and eliminated or if it cannot be eliminated, steps should be taken to mitigate the factor's negative effects. If the problem is insurmountable, changes to the project budget, schedule, and/or deliverables should be negotiated without delay.

• Formal Change-Control Mechanism: Effective project management depends on diligent management of inevitable changes. All changes should be documented and incorporated into the project plan so everyone knows when and why the change was made.

• Proactively Manage Risk: IT projects typically involve a number of significant risks and controversial issues that can prevent the team from moving ahead. These issues often tend to be political in nature, reflecting some organizational constituents' resistance to change or unwillingness to accept some of the facts of the project. The project manager should deal with such issues using formal, trackable processes, including escalation processes.

• Develop A Communication Program: Managing organization change is a critical element of any program. Ongoing communication among project participants, stakeholders, and end-users should be promoted throughout the institution using multiple channels, including newsletters; e-mails, department meetings, and user focus groups.

• Celebrate Successes: The project should have high visibility throughout its duration, and each milestone should be celebrated organization wide. Publicly acknowledging successes and demonstrating project momentum are effective ways to foster team coherence and the values that are intrinsic to high performance.

In addition to the above elaborated Project Management Tips, following are some general Project Management Tips which will also ensure you practice effective project management.

Project Management Tips for businesses in the modern day world:

• Ensure your plan is practical & complete
• Project costs realistically
• Clarify and document deliverables in contract
• Track contract deliverables, dates, costs
• Control costs and milestones
• Aggressively coordinate integration
• Regularly review & report status & corrections necessary
• Carefully monitor vendor testing: unit, integration, stability & performance, system, and operational segments
• Make corrections early
• Don't compress schedules at the end
• Look for ways to stay on schedule
• Carefully manage contracts, variances, change orders