Stages of project management: definition and key phases
Project management stages are a fundamental organisational concept in companies.
In everyday life, we manage and deal with projects such as: moving house, getting married, travel planning.... But we also have to manage projects in the workplace, such as the development and implementation of an accounting software, the organisation of a humanitarian mission in Africa or the launch of a new product or service.
Although they refer to different topics, they generally share the same stages of project management. In this article, Appvizer focuses on the notion of project management, breaking down the stages of a project.
Stages of project management
This video simply and clearly defines what project management is. Watch it to understand it all in just two minutes!
Stage 1: Planning and monitoring activities
Unless we turn to Chronos, God of time, to be able to plan and carry out our project on time, planning is a must!
Step 2: Divide up the project tasks
The first thing to do is to divide the project into several stages. A stage corresponds to an action, i.e. you can assign start and end dates to each stage. Keeping track of the project's life cycle is essential for the good organisation of the project. Otherwise, you will have to start all over again if you do not take into account the interrelationship between tasks.
Step 3: Stagger the tasks
Once you have done this action, you will be able to stagger the tasks and coordinate for each work team. Obviously in a micro enterprise, a team can be synonymous with a person, but the idea remains the same for any type of enterprise. Each specific project activity or task is attributed to each project participant according to his or her speciality.
Step 4: Manage tasks
Thanks to good organisation and planning of the workflow, if the person organises his or her activities well, he or she will always save time. It remains to find the right timeline for the execution of the project. For example, if you are a producer and distributor of dairy products, you cannot start with the production of the packaging (milk bottle) if you have not yet defined the presentation.
By monitoring the project schedule, you will be able to follow the evolution of all past, ongoing and future actions. This makes it easier to manage possible delays in the project.
Step 5: Control your costs
Once all the actions to be carried out have been identified, they are planned, attributed and monitored. Before project costs can be controlled, resource planning is essential.
Example of concrete project management
Returning to the example of the removal, you have probably already made a quotation either to hire a lorry or to contract a removal service.
In the first case, in addition to the estimate for hiring the lorry, you should also include an estimate for the friends and family who will come to help you with the move. It is a question of budgeting for material and human resources.
In the second case, the budget already takes into account all the costs of the removal service. All costs are included, you willonly need the keys to your new home! The role and functions have already been specified in the project and the tasks attributed to each participant.
Stage 6: Anticipating costs
Of course, Project Management software does not replace human thinking. It is up to you to make decisions about spending according to previously defined budgets .
However, such software allows you to gain visibility on the budget, manage expenses and thus avoid financial complications through effective resource planning.
Stage 7: Collaborate and share project progress
Welcome to the magical world of the "Virtual Open-Space", i.e. online solutions. Teams or collaborators all work together on the same platform. All the phases of the project are centralised:
- The work plan,
- the elements of the project,
- the related comments,
- documentation,
- e-mails,
- instant messaging linked to the project, etc.
Everything is organised so that each collaborator can work autonomously. This action makes each participant responsible for the project, thanks to a shared work plan. In this way, we can self-evaluate ourselves according to the work carried out, while fulfilling the project's mission.
The integration of all the partners of a common project, in the same solution, favours the exchange of information. For example, with the Fitnet Manager solution, collaborative work encourages the exchange between individuals so that the project goes hand in hand. Mutual help and collaboration is easier, even when working at separate desks. Each actor participates and contributes to a common mission. Numerous administrative steps and lost documents are now history thanks to the joint collaborative platform.
7 keys to project management
The following infographic summarises the 7 keys to successful project management.
Final stage: choosing the best project management software
In summary, we can say that managing a project means planning, coordinating, managing, controlling costs and respecting the established deadline. There are free and paid online tools for project management, adapted to the needs of your microenterprise or SME.
Study carefully the functionalities you need, the sector of activity, the size of your company to choose the solution designed for your activity.
Article updated, initially published in July 2018.
Article translated from Spanish