Top 6 Tips to Start Project Management Like a Pro!

In Project Management, you have to ensure that every member of your team delivers their tasks on time. This in order to ensure that projects can be launched within the timeframes discussed with clients. Not only that, but you also have to delegate tasks based on what’s needed by the client and the project.

Done right, you’ll be able to effectively distribute workloads and maximize the results your team can bring to a client. Try some of these tips during your next agile development project to begin your Project Management journey right!

Understanding your Resources and Priorities

This is typically the easiest to handle, as you already have a set team to work with. They’re picked by the very client you’re working for in order to work on the project. Also, the kick off meeting clients give you help set the expectations for the process. Make sure to listen closely to them.

All that’s left to do is have a deep understanding of your team and their experiences, and merge that with the client’s needs. This way, you’ll be able to identify which tasks are higher priorities over others and which members of your team can tackle them based on their skillset and current workload.

Clear Communication and Transparency

Communication is key in an agile development environment. This ensures that each and every request is completed as the client envisioned them. Any form of miscommunication can result in oversights that set projects back.

Having dedicated communication channels and daily sprints helps keep everyone on track with what’s going on, and ensures sufficient time to tackle misunderstandings, obstacles that can arise and give feedback to each team member. Zoom has been a highly used tool since the start of the pandemic, but it’s not the only one: Slack, Google Meet to even Discord are great mediums from where you can communicate between team members.

Keep Things Digestible

Tasks and roadmaps can seem almost daunting if not properly communicated to your team. This is why keeping things digestible and easy to understand can help your team improve their effectiveness and help complete tasks faster.

Break down the general objective into different micro tasks that help make your team’s tasks seem more manageable, include explanations for each task and their purpose to give them a better understanding on what they need to do. The easier the objective is to understand and visualize, the faster your team can reach them.

Recognize Expertise

There is a reason why your team has the individuals it has. Every one of them is an expert in their craft, so they should have a say on which tasks should be handled first and why. Delegating leadership and expertise when and where it counts can keep your team engaged in the objective. Not only that, but it gives you better context when organizing a final roadmap and plans.

It’s not only about making sure the team is making progress; it’s about making sure that they can look at that progress and own it.

Plan Ahead as Much as Possible

Projects can experience some switches in priorities and unexpected obstacles that can keep you from reaching your established goals. This is why it’s important to always have a contingency plan in place as to how to navigate them so that you can deliver on schedule.

Sometimes there are obstacles that appear which could never be expected or planned for. Still, that doesn’t mean you can’t analyse as much as you can in order to avoid these setbacks. It’s less about being prepared for everything, and more so to be prepared for anything. From potential obstacles to having systems in place to tackle those foreseen and any others that come up that weren’t.

Celebrate Successes

Sometimes in the midst of completing a client’s request, we forget that every advancement is thanks to a team effort. Even while using an agile approach for developing, may it be Kanban or Scrum, it’s important to recognize every member’s contribution to the project, and celebrate their success.

When one succeeds, the entire team succeeds. Remember this one fact, and not only will you boost everyone’s morale, you’ll be more productive and complete your goals faster. You’ll have project management handled like a pro!