Top Ten Tips for Project Managers

I thought I’d cover my top 10 list of tips for project managers. If you run into a concept or term that doesn’t make sense to you, check out my book Project Management for Mere Mortals.

1. Be clear about the business result that your project has been commission to produce. Coming up with some razzle dazzle product or service that doesn’t meet your clients requirements will definitely make you famous within your company – unfortunately in the wrong way. It’s a reputation you don’t want.
2. Plan the work the best way to get it done, then crash and fast track to get to the requested date. Some of your project tasks may have synergies or relationships with other tasks that need to be preserved. Don’t lose track of these relationships as you build your project schedule.
3. As you complete an iteration of planning, be sure to desk test this iteration against the previous iteration to verify you are still in scope. You want to avoid scope creep at all costs.
4. Build completion criteria for each task. Completion criteria will keep both the project manager and the person working on the task clear about what “done” looks like. It’s such a simple concept that is frequently overlooked.
5. Team norms will help your team work together effectively. Anyone who’s worked in a non-cohesive work group can vouch for this one.
6. The effect of taking on a change request is not always equal to the number of days provided in the estimate. Be aware of the incremental effect. The more change requests that you take on, the harder it is for the team to transition to the new work that needs to be done.
7. Build cost estimates for every task in your project regardless of whether you are held accountable for a budget or not. You need the practice and later you can use these figures for Earned Value Management.
8. Calculate the cost of quality at the end of the planning phase and several times during the execution of the project. Doing this will help hone your skills to deliver a better quality project.
9. Build an effective plan to work with your executives the same way you work with your team. The executive team is an integral part of the success of your project – why wouldn’t you plan how you’ll interface with them?
10. Have an attitude of success. It’s contagious. Your team looks to you for leadership – keep them moving in the right direction by modeling an attitude that says success.

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