Turner Invests Tuesday Tips - Project Management

Project work requires close management in order for them to finish on time, to the specification and on budget. Whether you deal with projects as part of your job, for personal projects or seem to be doing projects continually as an entrepreneur building their business, project management requires extra skills than normal management. Following these tips will get you closer to running successful projects.
 
“I can do things you cannot, you can do things I cannot; together we can do great things” – Mother Teresa

Tip 1:                Assemble a Power Team
A project usually requires many skills and if you or your team do not have these it is best to outsource to trusted suppliers/contractors. Therefore building relations with suppliers and contractors prior to you needing them for a project will help you when it comes to choosing and hiring them. Having a strong power team will help you run your project smoothly as they will be able to deal with the issues you are unable to, such as legal or building etc. (unless that is your business). 

Tip 2:                Plan & Review Progress
With a strong team around you, you will be able to delegate parts of the project for their management. Ensure you have scoped the project elements in detail, breaking them down in to bite-sized deliverables so you can easily track progress. Forming exact specifications or schedules of work will assist in achieving the desired result and assist with planning the budget and timeline. Identify any critical paths in your project, those tasks that if delayed will delay the whole project, and ensure enough resource and time is allocated to them in both planning and managing the tasks. 

Tip 3:                Communicate
Not only do you need a good plan and a great team to achieve it, you need to be able to communicate with the team in order for them to stay motivated and on target. Remember this is your project and not theirs so if they have no stake in finishing on time, it is unlikely they will. Therefore tie in rewards or final payments based on accurate work that finishes on time. You will need to form a balance between ‘hard’ project management such as risk and schedule control and ‘soft’ project management such as leading and motivating your team. 

There are many tools and techniques to project management that can be used and in some instances you can hire a specific project manager which, again, you should link rewards into finishing on time, to the quality expected and on or below budget. 

To enhance your general project management skills, PRINCE2 may be beneficial, or if you are running large scale property development projects then we can recommend a great course we have completed  (to be put in touch with this course, email pa@turnerinvest.co.uk with the subject Property Development Course Recommendation).

We hope you have found these tips useful and are able to use them to improve your business and investments. Don’t miss out on future tips - subscribe to Turner Invest newsletter on turnerinvest.co.uk and follow us on social media.

Thanks, 
Turner Invest
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