The success of any project depends on having a great plan as well as a platform for improving team productivity. As important as it is to execute a new project or idea, it’s that difficult to maintain efficiency throughout the project.

For a project manager, it is imperative to see the bigger picture and do the best to manage the different tasks related to the project at hand. However, it is seen that many project managers struggle to keep track of tasks and end up losing control of everything. To avoid all the unnecessary chaos and confusion related to managing a project, you need reliable project management software that is designed to make the entire process smoother. This blog will help you understand the difference a good project management suite brings to your business and how to choose one!

Read more: Why is Project Management Software Crucial to Project Success in Remote Work Environment

What is Project Management?

The term project management can be defined as the approach one takes for planning and coordinating a project. Be it a small-scale entity, a decentralized team, or a global enterprise, there should be a proper channel available for project management. Every business is optimistic during the starting stages of a project, but it can get very difficult when it comes to overseeing the project development to the final product. This is where project management software comes to play.

Project management software applications have become a necessity in today’s competitive world. They are an essential pillar of support to get the job done regardless of the industry or domain. A project management platform can ensure that you get access to all the tools required to manage every task involved in the project. In other words, you have everything at hand to finish the project within the set deadlines and achieve the expected outcomes.

What are the Functions of Project Management Software?

Project management software like InfinCE can have many functions. InfinCE goes beyond the traditional project management software in numerous ways. It offers you an entire suite of apps at the price of a traditional project management application to ensure improved productivity. Below are some of the main features that make a project management suite exceptional – ensuring the platform you choose has these would be the first stepping-stone to success.

Read more: 5 Ways A Project Management Tool Can Help Your Business Grow

1. Cloud-Based Functionality

Cloud-based solutions have become a commonplace feature for forward-thinking businesses. What’s more, remote work culture has become the mainstream option for many businesses due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. With a robust project management suite that provides cloud-based services, you can ensure better collaboration among your team members no matter where they are located around the globe. In addition, cloud-based solutions are cost-effective, easier to implement, and scalable to meet your varied needs.

2. Seamless Collaboration Options

Seamless communication and collaboration are vital in every project to ensure that all the team members are on the same page. A project management solution like InfinCE can ensure cross-functional collaboration to simplify the way different teams work. You can easily communicate with your team members using the all-in-one platform to share important information and documents related to the task, which will make sure that the job is done efficiently and on time.

3. Easy Integration of Tools

As a project manager, you may find yourself using different productivity tools for different functionalities. For instance, you may use a tool for communication, another for assigning day-to-day tasks, and yet another to share files. An all-in-one project management suite like InfinCE can offer you a unified platform to manage everything. You can integrate as many apps into the software as you want to manage your project. This way, you will not have to juggle between different tools, which can lead to a loss in productivity.

This also means that you will get more time to spend on the important aspects of the project. The most essential tools you should have in your project management software include:

• Planning Tools: Your project management suite should have the right tools to let you map different tasks and describe task iterations clearly at the start of a project. This will help you to layout the project expectations upfront for your team members.
• Task Management Apps: The project management platform you choose should allow for seamless integration of productivity and task management apps to make day-to-day work easier. This could range from creating jobs to assigning tasks and setting deadlines to generating reports and more.
• Time Tracking Options: A successful project management strategy relies heavily on how different team members utilize their time for the different tasks assigned to them. With efficient project management software, you can track time and export timesheets from a single dashboard to monitor the performance of your team.

Read more: 5 Must-have Features In A Project Management Tool For Small Businesses

Added Functions to Look Out for in Your Project Management Software

The final output of a project depends a lot upon who is responsible for what. This demands keeping the team updated about the different tasks at all stages of the project as well as assigning tasks and job roles as required. With an all-in-one project management software like InfinCE, you can automate the assigning of repeated tasks based on specific rules to streamline the process. Moreover, you can also communicate the deadlines and responsibilities to your team more clearly when you are on the same platform.

InfinCE also makes it simpler to track the progress of the project by giving you a unified view of the various tasks on a single dashboard. This can not only help to monitor the performance of your team members but also motivate them in case they hit a roadblock or need some help in getting things resolved. This also means that you can prevent bottlenecks and break any silos before they affect your team’s overall productivity.

InfinCE also allows you to anticipate what can go wrong in a project and take the required actions in due time. This will keep the workflow unhindered so that the objectives of the project are achieved as expected. In a nutshell, a reliable project management software suite like InfinCE will help you to keep your team focused and organized to ensure optimal success for your business. So wait no more! Sign Up with InfinCE today and unlock unlimited possibilities for your business!

Best Practices to Optimize Project Management Communication

Agile project management is highly crucial in today’s remote-first, digital-first workplace. The remote work culture has emerged as a potential solution for handling various operational aspects across companies. Remote work management brings several benefits to the table, but it is not devoid of challenges. One of the biggest concerns in managing remote teams is effective communication.

Without consistent and effective project communication between the teams, it can be challenging for the managers to execute actions as planned. Likewise, lack of proper communication will make it impossible to ensure that everyone is on the same page about the project’s status and what changes have been made to it. Ineffective project communication can lead to transparency issues between the teams, affecting their productivity and overall results.

Download White Paper: Adapting to The Changing Face of Enterprise Collaboration

Common Challenges in Project Management Communication

Most managers fail to drive the optimum outcome when managing remote teams. It is because they do not start with a well-planned communication strategy. Remote work and project management should always have a robust communication strategy so that no unwanted scenario pops up. It prevents project teams from using ineffective channels at inappropriate times.

For instance, while dealing with an urgent customer request, email communication alone may not be effective. You may have to use telecommunication, video conferencing, or instant messaging platforms to solve the customer challenge immediately. At the same time, an everyday instant messenger may not support screen sharing or file sharing. Hence, it is crucial to adopt Digital Workplace Orchestration platforms like InfinCE to manage your projects. 

Read more: How Successful Leaders Engage Employees Using Modern Business Communication Tools like InfinCE 

Communication gaps in project management can also arise when some team members are not updated with the project’s progress. For example, suppose someone is handling the design aspect of the project and fails to update the design status to other members. In that case, the production team will have to wait until they receive notification regarding design completion. This can lead to trust and transparency issues and minimize employee productivity. 

Another challenge in project management communication is that managers often do not have the means to fine-tune their strategies as per the project’s progress. Even though the project communication management approach fits the implementation needs, companies may need to accommodate frequent change requests from the customer. It’s crucial to refine the communication and collaboration strategy to match the changing project management demands.

Read more: Business Process Management Strategy for your Small Business 

How to Ensure Project Management Communication Success

When developing the project communication plan, you need to determine how you can pass on the relevant information to the team members in due time. It’s also important to decide how you can share the necessary files and documents with the appropriate parties for carrying out their jobs. InfinCE’s project collaboration software can simplify all these processes.

How to Choose a Project Management Platform

An all-in-one project collaboration platform like InfinCE can come in very handy in team management, as it gives you an effective communication channel for different purposes. InfinCE’s project management software helps you handle knowledge management and data sharing functions. It allows you to oversee the progress and status of various project aspects on a unified dashboard.

Read more: 5 Key Features Every Project Management Dashboard Should Offer 

By adopting a reliable project management platform like InfinCE, you can rest assured that a proper communications workflow is in place. InfinCE helps deliver the data that your team members require to perform their job roles at every stage of the project. Moreover, it can also serve as a channel to collect feedback and improve the project management communication system to guarantee optimal results. InfinCE helps build trust among the team members by making your process more transparent.

Read more: 5 Ways A Project Management Tool Can Help Your Business Grow 

Best Practices to Handle Project Management Communication

Along with an all-in-one project management platform, you also need to implement the best project management communication strategy. The next step is to confirm if the strategy works as intended. As a business owner, you should regularly monitor the strategy. It includes conveying insights generated at each point of the project management process, how and where the data is processed, and how the team members apply insights to improve their work. 

Analyze the efficiency of your project communication strategy at regular intervals to identify any communication gaps and take steps to address them. Keep an eye on how your team members use the project communication platform. Review how project managers use the digital workplace platform to share team and project updates and dashboards. Project management software like InfinCE also helps encourage virtual socialization among team members. You can also use it to assess the performance of your project communication strategy and make changes if needed. 

Read more: 5 Best Practices To Enable Seamless Communication For Your Remote Workforce 

Tips to Manage External Communications

An agile project management tool allows you to communicate with all the parties involved in a project to ensure that you can reach your target outcomes on time. For instance, InfinCE OpenProject enables you to grant access to external users like your clients and other stakeholders. This improves the stakeholders’ visibility over the project’s status. They can recommend insights relevant to the execution of a specific project process. 

You can also manage access to the communication funnel for document sharing internally and for other purposes externally. This will help the team members find the required information instantly, which leads to improved transparency and productivity. On the other end, having a unified communications channel will make collaboration with clients and suppliers much easier for your team members.

Read more: 5 Must-have Features In A Project Management Tool For Small Businesses 

The Closing Note

Besides a robust communication strategy, you also need to ensure appropriate communication at the end of a project. Project management communication will help you confirm that the results meet the intended quality. You can also refine the approach and the process in due course.  

Communication should continue even after completing the project. Employee recognition, social conversations, and casual interactions go a long way in boosting remote team morale, which will eventually lead to high-end productivity and performance.InfinCE is a digital workplace orchestration platform that offers a vast array of collaboration apps, productivity tools, custom dashboards, centralized and private IT infrastructure, custom branding elements, a curated app marketplace, and a host of other features. Talk to us and find out how InfinCE can be your best project management companion.

Why empower your workforce with project management software?

Any organization that wants to serve its customers better should be well-equipped to effectively tackle the project management challenge. Handling multiple client projects and commitments while ensuring optimum utilization of resources involved is often a painful experience for most managers. This is where project management software makes a difference for companies that want to be successful with their daily work management. 

Project management software can help you create milestones and define the core objectives of the project. Studies have shown that 37% of companies today fail with either of these. How can a software-powered project management approach positively influence work management across organizations that handle heavy workloads?

Related Reading: 5 Digital Capabilities Every Small Business Needs To Invest In 2020

Here are a few ways by which project management apps help companies tide over the challenges that plague their work management process:

1. Consolidate Work

Successful delivery of the project to a customer involves a combination of contributions from the service delivery team, billing, finance, sales, account managers, documentation and several others. A comprehensive project management software can bring about a unified platform where all these stakeholders can track the progress of their individual jobs and tasks. It can be a one-stop solution that can help every step of the way from sending quotes to potential customers identified by the sales team to share invoices on the basis of service metrics delivered like billable hours and resource utilization. Bringing all these into a single platform can bring huge relief for managers across departments that are involved in delivering the final service or product to end customers.

2. Track Customer Sentiments

It is a fact that most customer aspirations change over the course of a project and a lot of effort gets wasted in managing changes. With a powerful project management tool in place, it will be easier to accommodate changes in project scope and new requirements without impacting service or work quality. It will be easier to send revised estimates of cost and timelines if everyone utilizes the digital platform to manage their tasks and dependencies. It will be easier to predict the impact that will be experienced due to a new scope change across all departments and stakeholder functions involved in its execution.

3. Foster a Collaborative Culture

When people work in teams to contribute towards a customer project, the most essential capability that they need for attaining success is collaboration. Teams need collaborative spaces where they can discuss work, plan meetings and schedule task deadlines. A project management software offers a virtual workspace that allows teams across departments or offices across geographies to come together and collaborate on a customer-facing task. This allows companies to manage and engage remote workers as well.

Related Reading: 5 Tips To Foster Team Collaboration In A Small Business Environment

4. Manage Dependencies

A comprehensive project management tool enables teams to work in sync and define dependencies in advance. This allows for proper planning and increased visibility into tasks that have multiple stakeholders who contribute to the end result. The improved transparency will ensure that every member of the team feels responsible for his or her outcome as they can see how their task progress is impacting the work of others. It also enables managers to seamlessly handle project schedules based on resource availability or task progress metrics.

5. Empower Leadership Decision Making

With a project management platform, it is possible to run risk analysis and other measurements on the progress of projects which can help leaders make better decisions. It is possible to calculate costing, resource utilization, timelines and other factors that can inspire decisions related to hiring, client communications, invoicing and even serve as an impetus for sales and marketing teams. Unexpected emergencies and risks can be avoided to an extent if all teams work in sync with the centralized project management tool. This includes the case of even remote workers and managing their working hours which may be in other time zones.

Project management will always be one of the key pillars of success for any business. From meeting customer expectations in delivery timelines to estimating resource requirements, it covers a wide spectrum of managerial activities that take a lot of effort. Bringing this entire aspect into a powerful digital platform will enable better operational efficiency and ultimately lead to a more productive workforce. Platforms like InfinCE have been helping business to manage their most critical operations successfully with digital power. 

Related Reading: Features to look for while selecting a project management tool for your small business

Project management is one of the key offerings from InfinCE. With a track record of enabling seamless project management for leading businesses across industries, InfinCE can be the game-changer in bringing a streamlined project management culture in your business. Talk to us today to know more.

Features to look for while selecting a project management tool for your small business

For any small business, the best way to ensure a culture of continuous success in their services and offerings is to seamlessly facilitate teams to work together on projects. Hence, the need for a simple yet powerful project management tool is a matter of high importance. 

Every member of a team needs to be able to track and manage activities in their individual and group level-dependent tasks. From a simple tracker of daily meetings or scrum updates to enabling faster completion of dependent tasks, there are quite a few capabilities that small businesses must look out for while selecting a project management tool for their operations. Let’s have a close look at the top 5 features that every small business need in their project management tool today:

1. Resource Management

Without a doubt, any project management tool will be the key source for managing resources assigned to a project irrespective of the size or duration of the project. It gives a clear picture for decision-makers to lead efforts for new deals from customers based on the availability of resources free to take up the load. 

Such a tool gives management the visibility of their resource utilization from past or current in-progress projects as well as their availability for future work orders. This intelligence about resource utilization and availability will be useful in setting the tone for a number of activities within the organization such as marketing, recruitment, budgeting, infrastructure and maintenance planning and much more.

Related Reading: 5 Ways To Run A Successful Business With Remote Employees

2. Manage Scope Changes

Every project that your team sets out to work will have an initial scope of work defined according to customer expectations. But in most cases, customer expectations change in short time spans. This leads to situations where a project or individual task scopes require a change in definition midway into their original implementation. With an effective project management tool, it becomes easier for managers to identify points of impact with the scope change and delegate responsibility for change management to every individual or group that may be impacted by the change. 

Another important point to note here is that the intelligent insights you have into your team’s availability and task progress can be used to resist overwhelmingly large scope changes that have deviated considerably from initial customer requirements. It will be easier to give a data-backed response citing budgetary constraints, delivery timelines and resource availability for unaffordable scope changes.

3. Issue Management

In every project, it is the duty of the managers to identify obstacles and issues that prevent the project or sub-tasks from progressing. This becomes easier with a powerful project management tool. 

When various stakeholders of the project report an issue, it is easier for managers to identify dependent task owners or groups who can step up to resolve the issue in the fastest and best way possible. A faster resolution will enable faster time to market for customer deliverables and effective issue resolution will ensure that the delivered product or offering will meet or exceed customer expectations and avoid returns.

Related Reading: 5 Ways Small Businesses Can Promote Collaboration Among Teams

4. Schedule Management

As far as small businesses are concerned, they face the challenge of having to deliver on customer commitments in the fastest schedule possible. This is vital in their growth journey especially if it is the case of a budding startup. Having to rely on manual documentation and spreadsheets to keep track of subtasks and activities is not a welcoming endeavor. Having to follow up with concerned personnel for updates will result in a lot of time and effort overhead which can slow down delivery timelines. This is where a project management tool can step up the game. 

With effortless schedule management, easy and transparent team visibility into task progress, it becomes easier for managers to keep projects on schedule. It also offers insights for planning backup or replacement of resources in emergency situations without impacting delivery timelines.

5. File Management

Irrespective of the domain, any project will involve tons of documents and other files that need to be available for immediate access by all stakeholders. It may be related to project development, schedules, customer deliverables and so on. Without secure file storage and exchange channel, different personnel having access to the project will find it difficult to obtain relevant information on a need basis. 

A project management tool will enable easier and safer access to files such as documents with features such as permission control thereby eliminating unauthorized access. This is a key feature to look out for in a project management tool for small businesses with the security aspect taking center stage to protect sensitive customer data as well.

With the rise of digital, organizations are re-thinking the way they monitor and manage complex customer engagements and projects. For small businesses, the need for effective project management is essential to keep a sustained growth in their business. With InfinCE you can build smarter business practices that enable collaboration among departments and organizations, and engage your customers and workforce better. With seamless project management capabilities, it can help drive success faster for your customer projects. Get in touch with us to see how InfinCE can support your project management efforts.