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Manage Projects…but You’re NOT a Project Manager? No Problem.

(Note: This is the first article in a two-part series.)

Everyone isn’t a project manager, but everybody manages projects.

And even if the work you do isn’t technically a project, I’m willing to bet it’s still tied to a larger project, program, or portfolio. So, it doesn’t matter whether you’re a full-time project manager or not. You still support projects.

For example, you may be a non-project manager in one of the following fields…

• IT
• Sales
• Marketing
• Engineering
• Healthcare
• Education
• Finance
• HR

Or maybe you are a full-time project manager, but you’re looking for a simpler way to manage projects.

Well, look no further. Project management has been reimagined for professionals just like you.

So, stick around. You’ll discover what you need to succeed.

Get Work Done and Deliver Results

There’s an unspoken truth in the project management world. And it’s this.

You’re managing more than just projects. A lot of the work you do may be labeled as ‘projects’ when in reality they’re a collection of day-to-day tasks.

It’s your responsibility to deliver the greatest amount of value to your clients within the confines of agreed-upon constraints. And it doesn’t matter how it’s labeled.

For example, let’s say you work in marketing and sales. In addition to your normal responsibilities such as identifying, prospecting, closing, and growing accounts, you may also be tasked with -

Some of these may be project related while others aren’t. But, let’s be honest. Do you really care?

You just want to get work done and deliver it successfully…without losing your mind in the process.

What you need is a fast, but simple way to get up and running while avoiding getting bogged down in the details. Also, it wouldn’t hurt if you could gain complete visibility over how your work is progressing, as well as easily communicate and collaborate with stakeholders.

Sounds like a dream come true, right?

Well, it is. But there’s something you need to do first.

View Work Holistically

You’re faced with a serious challenge. And it’s eating away at your ability to get work done efficiently.

Like most non-project managers, your work is probably disconnected. Trust me, you’re not alone.

Welcome to the…

Almost a Project Manager, but Not Quite a Project Manager Club.

Nod your head if you spend your days floating from one project to another like a butterfly while squeezing daily tasks in whenever you can. Furthermore, have you experienced any of the following?

• You lack a single repository from which you can manage all of your work.
• You have no way of viewing all work activities from initiation through closeout.
• You don’t have an interactive dashboard to view real-time data, so you can make informed decisions.
• You’re not optimizing your resource productivity, so you’re unable to forecast resource demand or confidently gauge your ability to take on new assignments.
• You’re using little, if any, preconfigured templates (e.g., schedule and budget).
• Your teams aren’t documenting lessons learned. And if they are, they aren’t in a central location.
• You regularly switch between working on projects and everyday tasks, but lack the ability to track your progress holistically.
• You’re unable to easily produce status updates and reports.
• You’re not streamlining workflows or automating repetitive tasks.

It goes without saying, but this is less than optimal (and hard to scale).

For example, the American Psychological Association’s research found that productivity was reduced by 40 percent due to the mental blocks caused by switching tasks.

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

The way we view work and make decisions needs to adapt to the times. If you want to unlock the full potential of your projects (and work in general) and drive success, you’ll need to look at the total scope of your work.

This means you’ll organize your work in such a way that you can aggregate projects into a single view or analyze them on an individual basis. Also, be sure to share access to relevant stakeholders, so they can monitor your teams’ progress. This will keep them in the loop and reduce the need for periodic updates, as well as status meetings.

Many efficiencies can be gained by connecting your work and viewing it holistically. All that’s left is for you to bring it together, so you can analyze your work in one place.

Manage ALL of Your Work in a Hub

Let’s reimagine project management.

As stated earlier, your work is probably disconnected. Meaning, your work is spread across multiple platforms, your data is siloed, and you’re using a number of non-integrated, redundant tools to perform your job.

You need something that’s simple, but powerful, and easy to use. This way, you can quickly get up and running on your projects without getting bogged down in the details.

Begin by bringing all of your work (including projects) under one technological roof. This way, you’ll graduate from managing a bunch of disparate, individual projects to managing all of your work in one place.

This is also known as a hub. You know, an integrated system that connects various project management-related software, so you can easily track projects from the proposal stage all the way through to project completion and handoff.

Now there are a variety of ways you can do this, but no matter which route you take, the solution you choose should at a minimum -

1. Be cloud-based and accessible from any device
2. Be able to integrate with existing (and future) software
3. Enable you and your team to collaborate on the same project at the same time
4. Allow you to easily set up meetings, capture conversations, and share documents
5. Streamline and monitor workflows (e.g., automate repetitive tasks)
6. Monitor your project’s progress and notify you if it starts to slip
7. Offer a dashboard and real-time updates across devices

While these features are helpful and will get you off to a good start, there are some additional features you’ll want to look for, particularly if you want to grow over time.

For example, does the solution have an AI component built-in? If so, does it offer the ability to -

• Automatically collect, track, and report data
• Conduct voice queries and commands
• Reduce human errors that lead to issues

Also, can it communicate with other software’s AI assistants? This is important since the most widespread use of AI in project management software is via chatbots. They can save you time and provide quick support on everything from menial tasks to higher-level predictive analytics.

Success, in today’s environment, requires a solution that truly reimagines the way project work gets done and brings all of your work together in one place, so you can see the bigger picture and make better, strategic decisions.

Final Thoughts

Managing all of your assignments like they’re complex projects is overkill.

A lot of the work you do may be task-based and not require full-scale project management methodologies and software. In this case, you may simply need a tool that provides workflow structure, fosters information exchange, and supports collaboration between stakeholders and teams.

As a matter of fact, today’s managers should be able to manage work in any form. This is especially true if you’re a member of the “Almost a Project Manager, but Not Quite a Project Manager Club”.

At the end of the day, it’s your job to deliver the greatest amount of value to your clients within the confines of agreed-upon constraints. So, don’t get caught up in how your work is labeled or what title you’re given.

The key is to view your work holistically and manage all of it in a hub. If you do this while remaining flexible and adapting to changes in the environment, you’ll optimize your work and improve productivity over time.

Now, this is how you get work done and deliver successful results!

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In the next article, we’ll go over how non-project managers can set up a work hub and leverage technology to get work done (and increase productivity). Stay tuned…

About Oliver Yarbrough, PMP®

Oliver is a LinkedIn® Learning Author, speaker, trainer, and leading expert in project management, PMP® Exam Prep, and growth strategies to raise competitiveness. You can follow his musings at OliverYarbrough.com and on Twitter @OliverYarbrough.

You can get a 10-day free trial to the LinkedIn® Learning platform. It will give you access to an entire library of courses including my course on Artificial Intelligence for Project Managers and Project Management: Preventing Scope Creep.

#FutureOfWork #ProjectManagement #Collaboration #Productivity

Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.