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Project Management

How to Measure Project Management Success

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Project Management Success

There are several factors to consider when measuring project management success. Yes, the primary goal of every project is to meet the deadline and stay within budget. However, whether or not the project delivered value to the business is also an excellent gauge for success.

Measuring the success of a project once it has come to completion should be routine practice in every organization. A proper assessment of the project’s effectiveness will offer valuable insight and lessons that can be implemented in future projects.

Here are six factors for measuring the success of a project

Stick to the Schedule

If a product launch date or budget relies on the project, there is typically a hard deadline to meet. Ultimately, the success of a project is based primarily on whether it was completed on time or not.

Indeed, there are clients that may be more flexible with deadlines as they view a quality product is much more important than being on schedule. However, committing to a timeline is still ideal to keep team members productive.

Complete the Scope of the Project

The scope is the intended result of the project and everything required to bring it to completion. Your success can be measured based on whether the project was achieved based on the objectives within the given framework.

Get Weekly Satisfaction Ratings

Start by asking the clients how satisfied they were with the results and if their needs were met. To avoid taking up too much of their time, ask them to rate your weekly performance rather than asking them to provide you with a lengthy description of their findings.

Succeed as a Team

Don’t overlook your team. How they feel the project went tells you a lot about its level of success. And because they were closest to the project, they may be able to provide you with insight about roadblocks and how they can be avoided in the future.

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Stay On-Budget

Completing the project within budget is probably one of the biggest indicators of whether a project was a success or not. Your team should always be aware of how the money is spent and the roles they play in ensuring they stay on-budget. Clients are typically given a quote at the start of the project, and they expect that you stick to it.

Exceed Quality Expectations

The goal shouldn’t be just to meet expectations but to exceed them. With all projects, do track quality so that you can make adjustments for your future projects. Consider the value of your work as a way to advertise your capabilities. Let the quality of your completed projects be your calling card.

An excellent way to guarantee that you are not only completing your projects but also measuring your progress along the way is by using project management software. Project management software such as TeamHeadquarters provides project management services for all areas of your organization.

Get a free demo of TeamHeadquarters.

Why an IT Project Manager Needs to Understand Strategy

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To achieve business goals, one must have a well-conceived strategy.

It’s important for IT project managers to understand what strategy is and to develop strategies for their projects. There’s more to project management than just completing the project within the time specifications; it’s about doing it on time and more importantly, right.

Despite our best intentions, projects may not always go the way we planned. In fact, projects often evolve, and a good project manager must know how to adapt. To move forward, project managers must have the ability to recognize what is critical and noncritical and make the necessary adjustments.

A project manager who doesn’t understand strategy may be so concerned with finishing a project or meeting a deadline that they overlook the other requirements of the actual plan. They may also fail to make the necessary adjustments that will result in a finished product that is not only finished on time but is of value.

Applying Reason to Project Management

Project managers must realize that strategy doesn’t always mean sticking to the plan but knowing when to step back and identify if the plan needs re-evaluation. Strategy means being flexible while maintaining direction to execute clear objectives.

Thoroughly outlined project plans must be open to communication. The IT project manager’s role is to oversee the process and plans, execute and delegate responsibilities around the company’s IT-related goals. The project manager’s strategy should involve communicating with all business resources to meet project milestones and to ensure that all involved are operating in sync.

The Role of Project Management Software in Strategy

Many project managers know the value of project management software and how it can help with the implementation of their project plan. Project management software gives them an easier way to produce and disseminate status reports and project updates to those involved in the project.

IT project managers can best demonstrate strategy by having control of project ticket queues, integrated email agents, resource management, task scheduling, and project groups. Project management software like TeamHeadquarters will give IT managers all that including portfolio dashboards, integrated status reporting, integrated and customizable reporting, the inclusion of customers on project tasks and tickets and a Customer Self-Service Portal.

Excellent project management means being able to quickly communicate issues, risks, change requests, and incidents. A good strategy means involving relevant technology to complement your project management.

By having a project dashboard, you’ll have instantaneous feedback on what’s going on across all projects. You’ll not only have the ability to identify your project risks but also have an increased awareness of potential problems.

Project management software like TeamHeadquarters has been developed because of the essential requirement for IT project managers to understand the project, define a strategy and execute a plan.  That is why a project management system covers all aspects of project management such as resource management, task management, task scheduling, status reports, integrated Gantt charts, issue management, and financial management.

Remember, a strategy is much more than just meeting your business goals. It’s about the steps that you take to have a competitive advantage.

To see how you can integrate TeamHeadquarters into your project management strategy, click here for your free trial. 

5 Principles of Schedule Management

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What is schedule management?

In project management, the schedule refers to the intended start and finish dates of a project’s milestones and activities. Completing deliverables on time equates to good project management. Your schedule serves as your timetable for a project that will show you how you are progressing while taking into account factors like limited resources and potential setbacks.

However, despite a clear schedule, there is always the potential for uncertainties. Therefore, smart project management should follow some simple rules:

1.    Don’t Promise What You Can’t Deliver

Scheduling will demand that you set a date of completion based on predictions and expectations. Before you commit to a schedule, you should have had ample time to evaluate all the factors. The last thing you want to do is make a promise to a client that you cannot keep for the sake of giving them an answer on the spot.

2.    The Client Should Be the First to Know If the Schedule Goes Sideways

Admitting to the customer that something’s gone wrong and that you’ve now been thrown off schedule is hard to do;  however, do it you must. You might be tempted to keep quiet about it and just wait until the client asks about your progress and deal with it then. You’ll find that this is a surefire way for the customer to lose trust in you.

3.    Avoid Scope Creep

Change is inevitable, and that’s why curbing scope creep becomes so challenging. Too often, IT project managers find themselves failing to put their foot down and be tough when receiving requests for additional functionalities. And when team members who are eager to please and impress start to make unauthorized decisions to add more value to the product, the scope creeps.

Ensure your scope change process is rock solid and that it also includes the impact on the project schedule. Follow the original specification document and don’t allow unmanaged contact between your team and the client.

4.    Spread Contingency Throughout Your Project Timeline

Even the most carefully laid out plans have no escape from random occurrences. Equipment breaks and people call in sick. Anything that could go wrong inevitably goes wrong. This is why you should always have a pool of contingency throughout the lifespan of your project. In other words, plan for the unplanned.

5.    Pick the Right Level of Detail

Define the amount of control you want. If your involvement in every aspect of the project is not necessary, don’t push for multiple meetings within the day that will collectively slow things down.

When mapping out your schedule, identify to what degree your team will need to update each other to ensure that everyone involved has the same understanding of what needs to be achieved and by when. You’ll find that there’s a significant difference in productivity between day-to-day scheduling versus week-to-week. It all boils down to the type of project and the level of control and attention it demands.

Project management solution, TeamHeadquarters, knows all about the many uncertainties that take a project off-schedule. That’s why it aims to keep you in control and focused, maximizing the efficiency and effectiveness of your time, as it also eliminates all drudgery from project management.

For a free demo of TeamHeadquarters, click here.

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Tips for Successful Project Management

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Successful Project management is a difficult undertaking, often more complex than you might realize before taking on the responsibility. It requires strategic and tactical planning, as well as time, task and team organization and oversight — particularly for complex, long-term projects with many moving parts. [Read more…] about Tips for Successful Project Management

Should I Trust My Project Team?

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This seems like an easy question, doesn’t it? Should I trust my project team? Well, of course I should. They’re on my side. They have my back. They want the same things as I want. They’re trying to accomplish the same things on the project. If we don’t work together toward the same goals then we all suffer and the project suffers and likely fails.

[Read more…] about Should I Trust My Project Team?

Learning Lessons on our Projects

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lessons learnedHow many of us actually sit down and conduct lessons learned sessions at the end of our projects? Show of hands? Not many, actually. One survey I conducted of project management professionals indicated that 57% conduct lessons learned sessions on fewer than 10% of their projects. I admit…I’m guilty. I write about it, yet I don’t always do it. Why? I have my reasons. They usually fall into one of these excuse categories:

[Read more…] about Learning Lessons on our Projects