Project managers constantly juggle time and productivity in order to keep their projects on track. The more efficient and productive you are, the more successful your project will be. Juggling so many balls at one time can seem daunting, but with the right tools and tips, it can be done.
This is the second article in our Back to Basics Proteus Project Management Guide. Our aim is to give an overview of the tools and techniques commonly used in energy sector project management over a series of digestible, easy to read posts.
In this blog post we will discuss some methods to help you stay on top of your game and keep your project running smoothly, looking at 5 key areas of time and productivity:
- Managing your teams’ time
- Project time estimation
- Setting project goals
- Prioritizing project tasks for better productivity
- Removing inefficiencies and distractions
- Using technology to help you stay organized and productive
Managing your teams’ time
Any successful project depends on effective time management. For example, if you see that a particular task is taking much longer than expected, you can analyze why and make changes to improve efficiency. Additionally, time tracking can help you identify which tasks are billable and which are not, as well as how many hours your team is actually working versus idle time. This data can be used to improve team productivity and performance as the project is executed, and to make changes to improve time management on future projects. It can also help you to identify any bottlenecks or areas where your team could be more efficient. Tracking this data can give you a valuable advantage in managing your time effectively and ensuring the success of your projects. Overall, time management is a critical tool for anyone looking to optimize their workflows and get the most out of their team.
Project time estimation
When it comes to estimating the time required for a project, there are a few key factors to consider. First, you’ll need to compile a list of all the tasks that need to be completed, as well as the resources required for each task. Next, you’ll need to estimate the effort required for each task. This can be done by considering the skills and experience of your team, as well as the complexity of the task. Finally, you’ll need to cost out each task, taking into account the cost of materials, labor, and any other associated expenses. Once you have all of this information, you can drill down and create estimates for each of the project components. By taking the time to accurately estimate the cost, effort, and resources required for a project, you can ensure that your team has the time and resources necessary to complete the project successfully.
Setting project goals
One of the most important aspects of successfully managing a project is setting goals. By having a clear understanding of what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, and how it needs to be done, you can remove potential issues before they cause problems. Additionally, you can use data insights to identify bottlenecks and manage time and budget concerns effectively. Finally, setting deadlines for different tasks will help increase accountability and focus. Setting effective project goals can help you control variation and change in scope, they give you focus and increased accountability, and they highlight potential budget concerns. But how do you go about setting effective goals? The first step is to drill down and get data-driven insights into where your business currently is and where it needs to be. Once you have a clear sense of the big picture, you can start setting specific milestones that are realistic and achievable. Finally, make sure to manage your time and resources carefully; an effective goal is one that is delivered on time and on budget. By following these simple steps, you can ensure that your project is always moving forward.
Prioritizing project tasks for better productivity
Leaders often need to re-evaluate processes to ensure essential tasks are being completed without bottle-necks or project time being impacted. If a manager identifies essential tasks and dependencies, they can free up team members’ time to focus on essential tasks while ensuring that dependencies are still being met. A first step is to identify the time your employees spend on work that can be avoided and the dependencies of essential tasks. Some typical examples of such assignments are meetings, social networking, emails, etc. While some of these activities may be essential, project managers should keep these at a minimum to ensure that time spent working on key project deliverables is not affected. By taking these measures, you can help reduce stress among your team and increase your overall project utilisation rate, a key metric for measuring successful time and productivity management.
Removing inefficiencies and distractions
In any organization, there are always opportunities to remove inefficiencies and improve productivity. One way to do this is to reduce distractions and stay on task. This can be achieved by ensuring that data is controlled and that project data is available in real-time. By remaining focused, productivity and output will increase. Ensuring that you have clear accountability with reliable and accurate project data made available to the whole team, is only possible if there is full visibility over project progress and budgets. Make this data visible to everyone in the organization, and you will see immediate improvements in accountability and productivity, resulting in increased morale and a sense of pride in the work being done.
Using technology to help you stay organized and productive
There are a wide variety of project management tools available to help project teams stay organized and productive. A work management solution with robust progress tracking across time and project delivery can provide valuable insights into employee productivity and project hours. A project dashboard can also give you real-time visibility into every granular project data point, allowing you to more effectively control the output of your team. For complex and detailed engineering projects, multi-level project hierarchies give you the ability to capture every bit of project data, ensuring that nothing falls through the cracks. By leveraging these tools, you can enhance employee productivity, improve project management, and get a better understanding of your overall project costs. By improving project planning, and making accurate project cost estimations, projects are set up with a fundamentally stronger structure for success. Customisable work management solutions are particularly useful for complex and detailed engineering projects. Moving away from complex, error-prone spreadsheets, they provide the ultimate control over our productivity and output.
Managing time and productivity is critical for any business, but especially so when it comes to complex projects. There are a number of techniques and tools that can help you stay on top of things and ensure your team is productive. We’ve looked at some key ways to do this, from managing teams’ time to estimating project timelines, setting goals, and removing distractions. Our favorite tool for getting organized and staying productive is Proteus. It allows you to manage all aspects of your project in one place, including tasks, deadlines, files, and communication. If you want to learn more about how Proteus can help your business run smoother and more efficiently, read our datasheet.
About us
Xergy Group’s Proteus work management solution is designed to work with your existing systems, and to scale and evolve as your business evolves. It was created by energy sector professionals, for the diversified energy sector, and delivers an end-to-end project management software platform compliant with ISO audit requirements and common project management frameworks.
How to get Proteus
Proteus’ work management software is a cloud-based system designed for businesses of all sizes to handle projects of unlimited complexity. Each Proteus feature is aimed at making bottom line improvements by improving utilisation, streamlining workflows, providing quick and efficient access to resources and reducing overheads. One of the unique advantages of Proteus is that we offer a free onboarding consultation service to ensure your company account is set up according to your company’s needs.
We recommend getting setup on a free trial. Proteus operates under a software-as-a-service (SaaS) model. We offer Enterprise packages and flexible pricing solutions: contact our team to learn more.
We designed Proteus to be simple, and that means you can get up and running on Proteus without an IT team or support from a programmer. You will want to spend a bit of time configuring the admin console so that you have everything set up to suit your company structure, but it’s very intuitive and you don’t need a PhD in IT. However, we want you to get the best out of what is a brilliantly powerful tool, so don’t hesitate to ask for our support. We have a team of product experts who are ready to help you with the configuration process, so get in touch today by filling the form below:
