This is a guest post from Scott Miraglia.
Projects are an important part of every industry, from the technology sector right through to the construction industry.
But there are so many moving parts to a project, from the initial ideas stage right through to the final sign-off and completion.
In between, you need to manage communication, feedback, goals, and reports – it’s not as easy as it sounds, right? In fact, it can seem pretty overwhelming if you think about it.
The important thing is to keep a project on track if you want it to be successful. A derailed project can mean a mammoth loss in revenue, disheartened staff, and the need to start again at square one. Ouch.
But how do you make sure things run as smoothly as possible? We’ve lined up some top tips to help you keep your project on the straight and narrow.
6 Steps to Making Your Project Successful
Step 1. Define the Project Scope
The first part of successful project management involves outlining the project from the ground up. In one study, 44% of respondents said that managing a project the right way actually improved the quality of the final product, while another 38% said it improved customer satisfaction.
At this stage, your aim is to lay out the entire scope of the project. This includes everything from any deliverables and their delivery date, to the software and technology you’ll use, to the people who will help you.
Step 2. Set Goals
Every project needs goals – otherwise how will you know that it’s been a success?
It’s a good idea to set an overall goal and then break that up into smaller, more manageable tasks. The last thing you want to do is overwhelm your team with a goal that seems too big at the start.
SMART goals are a great place to start.
These are goals that are Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Relevant, and Time-Based. For example, “make a leaflet” is a “bad” SMART goal, but “create a two-page leaflet that bullet points the major benefits of our product by the end of August” is a “good” SMART goal because it is specific, can be measured, and has a dedicated time frame attached to it.
Step 3. Create Timelines (But Prepare to Be Flexible)
You’ll have covered this bit briefly when planning the project scope, but now it’s time to put dates for each task you need to deliver to reach the final due date.
You might find that you have hard deadlines you need to set for things – for example, if you need print materials you’ll need to get them to the printers by a set deadline – but, for other things, it’s best to add a deadline that’s flexible.
As you probably know, not everything runs smoothly in a project, and you want to give yourself some leeway in case things go south. If you’ve given yourself extra room for tasks, you won’t find yourself playing catch up for the rest of the project.
You can use a free tool like Google Calendar to create colour-coded timelines and share them with your team, or you can use a designated project management tool like Monday.com or Asana to get a more visual overview of what needs to be done and when. You can also use PomoDone App to boost your productivity and focus on the execution of your tasks, created in the mentioned tools (and many others).
Step 4. Have Regular Meetings
It’s important that you know what’s happening with a project every step of the way. But, more than that, it’s important for the whole team to know who’s working on what and when they’ll be finished by.
These meetings will give you the chance to go over what’s been completed and setup what happens next. It’ll help team members to know where their tasks fit into the process and give them a sense of being part of a team throughout the project.
You can schedule these into your shared Google Calendar or your chosen project management tool to make them a mandatory part of the project.
Step 5. Provide Constructive Feedback
A lot of people will tell you that you need to provide feedback during a project, but you need to do more than that: you need to provide constructive feedback. Instead of telling team members what they’re doing wrong or right, work with them to discover their weaknesses and strengths so that you can enhance the project with them.
It’s been found that strong support like this is a key component of a successful project. In one survey, 62% of successful projects had sponsors who were actively supportive.
Step 6. Report and Tweak
Reporting is a vital part of a project – especially if you’re presenting to external individuals or organizations. Reports cover everything that happened throughout the duration of the project, present the finished project, and relay any stats, data, or findings that have arisen since the project was completed.
Reports are not only a great way to bookend a project and share your results, but they help you tweak your future project planning process. For example, if you found that one task took much longer than expected, you can account for that in your next project plan.
Make Your Project Successful
Planning a project isn’t easy.
As we mentioned at the start, there are tons of turning cogs that have to click together to make it work. Not only are you dealing with timelines, deadlines, budgets, and goals, you’re also having to manage people, support teams, and provide constructive feedback.
Hopefully these tips will help you make sure your next project runs smoothly. All you need to do is break the process down into steps, starting from an all-encompassing overview and working down to manage each and every task.
Once you can do that, you’ll be able to see the bigger picture, know who’s working on what, and be able to keep track of everything that’s going on while the project is underway.
About the author: Scott Miraglia is the CEO of Elevation Marketing. He is a balanced risk-taker with nearly three decades of experience starting and growing advertising and marketing agencies. His business acumen is matched with a drive to build creative teams that thrive in open, collaborative work environments. Scott seeks out the best creative individuals, not only to provide quality service to clients, but to also help shape the future direction of Elevation Marketing. He remains dedicated to helping his talented teams develop unique and effective integrated marketing programs that help employees realize their full potential while serving up impressive business wins for clients.