But even the most charismatic and self-reliant people are not working in a vacuum. Team management is always instrumental in any major project. The truth is that teamwork is the shoulder on which all major successes rest. Whether that be the building of the pyramids in Egypt or the dominance of Apple in the marketplace.

But don’t take our word for it. There are many teamwork examples throughout history. We cherry-picked 12 of our favorite inspirational examples of teamwork as it applies to a variety of circumstances. It won’t be long before you’re won over by the benefits of teamwork and collaboration.

If you’re looking to level up your teamwork capabilities, see how ProjectManager’s award-winning software can assist you. Regardless of how your team prefers to work, ProjectManager can help facilitate real-time collaboration. From Gantt charts to kanban boards to task lists, we have a range of project management tools to keep you productive during all stages of your project.

1. The Beatles, Live in Hamburg

Everyone knows the Beatles. They defined the 1960s, moving from the Mersey Beat that made them a boy band that the girls loved to folk and psychedelic rock, inventing new genres seemingly with ease. Their music is the soundtrack of an era and continues to influence musicians to this day. But those are the flowers that grew from the dirt. That fertile soil that nourished and sustained them was far from their Liverpool home.

During the very early 1960s, before any radio play and Beatlemania wasn’t yet a word, they were the house band for a ruckus portside bar in Hamburg, Germany, called the Kaiserkeller. There they had to play for hours and hours, stretching three-minute pop songs into 20-minute jam sessions. It was in this crucible, that the four soon-to-be mop tops bonded musically. It was through live performances that they learned to put on a show, according to George Harrison on the Beatles Anthology DVD. This is clear evidence that the Beatles’ success can be attributed to such teamwork examles along their career.

The magic of the Beatles is that four individuals learned through intense and extended live sessions to play as one, to anticipate each other and develop an almost intuitive communication. That set the stage which allowed their songwriting gifts to flourish. It was teamwork, plain and simple, that gave the Beatles the musical chops to develop their potential.

2. The Miracle on Ice

The United States upset victory over the Russian hockey team in the 1980s Olympics was called the “Miracle on Ice” for good reason. The Russian team had dominated the sport for as long as anyone could remember, and in the United States, hockey has always been a second- or third-tier sport. How the 25-year-old team captain Mike Eruzione got his team to bring home the gold and beat the odds-on favorites, the seasoned Soviet team is a most inspirational teamwork example.

Related: Teamwork Quotes: The 25 Best Quotes About Working Together

As a child, Eruzione never thought of himself as a star player; he thought of himself as a team player. He believed success was due not to individuals excelling as much as everyone on the team carrying their own weight and having a strong work ethic. Although at Boston College he didn’t make the cut and was placed on the B team, he was told not to lose confidence.

It was those early lessons in teamwork that helped him gain the respect and trust of the Olympic hockey team. He understood that there were a lot of egos on the team that had to be put aside for the good of the team. Everyone had to feel they were contributing. The backup goalie, Steve Janaszak, never played in the Olympics, but he was as important to the win as anyone. Do you believe in miracles?

3. Apollo 11 Moon Landing

One of the most historic examples of teamwork is the Apollo 11 1969 mission. While the world focused on the three astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, the former two who walked on the moon, most remember only Armstrong and his famous line upon being the first human being to set foot on the satellite: “This is one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”

However, behind that momentous moment are years of research and teams of people working diligently to do what no one had done before. Mission planners worked for two years prior to launch, studying the moon’s surface using satellite photographs in order to discern the best site for a lunar landing.

Related: See how NASA Uses ProjectManager

According to NASA, there were an estimated 400,000 people involved in making the moon landing possible. This included teams of scientists, engineers and technicians, many who had not worked in aerospace before. To make for a more cohesive team, the astronauts worked with many of these groups, making the human connection that is the blood of any team. So considering all of this, the Apollo 11 moon landing was one of the most massive teamwork examples of the 20th century.

4. Wikipedia

The digital age is defined by teamwork, and one new media company illustrates that more than any other. Wikipedia is everyone’s go-to when they need a quick answer. It’s the library of the internet, a collaborative engine of knowledge that is constantly evolving.

There were once encyclopedias that collected the world’s knowledge, but these are static volumes that are only updated every number of years. Also, what is printed between their covers is not up for debate. If you have a problem with what’s listed, you could write to the editors and maybe even get a response.

But Wikipedia changed that whole paradigm by recruiting an army of volunteer writers and editors who put the facts into its website. This simple but effective and massive example of teamwork is almost incomprehensible in its scope and yet runs surprisingly well. There are mistakes, but the site is built in such a fashion that these anomalies are quickly discovered. Teamwork is essential for Wikipedia because, in a sense, everyone who has ever landed on the site is part of the team.

Related: 30 Fun Team-Building Games for Work

5. The Starbucks Expansion

It might be a joke now (how there’s a Starbucks on every block and soon occupying every storefront), but it wasn’t always like that. In fact, the dominance of Starbucks was never as sure a thing as it looks in retrospect or over its company timeline. Back in the early 1990s, Starbucks chairman and CEO Howard Schultz had opened a few hundred new stores across the United States, but the business was not successful.

The ambitious expansion was hitting problems concerning customer service and a lack of communication between various levels of the company. The company might have brewed a winning cup of joe but their customer service and employee engagement were staler than a pot of yesterday’s coffee.

In 1995, Howard Behar became the president of Starbucks and with him came advancements in company culture. He cultivated a work environment that met the employees’ needs, which in turn inspired them to better serve their customers. It was his belief that it was not the coffee they were selling but the customer experience, which gave Behar the mission statement to rally his teams to work together more effectively.

6. D-Day

D-Day, or the invasion of Normandy, retaking Nazi-occupied France, was the turning point of World War II in Europe. Many things went into the success of D-Day. There’s the logistics management of aligning so many troops and equipment while keeping the whole operation a secret. Naturally, it was also a strategic win for the Allies. But all these parts worked together only because of teamwork.

The beaches of Normandy, which was the spearhead of the invasion, were boobytrapped and obscured by wooden stakes, metal tripods and barbed wire. Casualties were high on that day June 6, but if it wasn’t for beach-cleaning teams they would be higher, according to D-Day: The Battle for Normandy by Antony Beevor.

From the generals on down to the grunts, everyone who sacrificed their lives for the greater good did so because they worked together as a team for ideals that are more important than individuals, which led them to leave their imprint on history, making it one of the most significant teamwork examples on this list. It’s almost impossible to understand how people could place themselves in harm’s way like that, but teamwork makes us bigger in more ways that we can count.

Related: 10 Strategies to Motivate Your Team

7. The Iliad

This oral epic attributed to the Greek poet Homer, which was put down in writing sometime in the 8th century B.C., might be historical, or it might not. It’s hard to say. Historians have debated whether there was in fact a Trojan War or not. So, why include this? Because it might be the granddaddy of all inspirational tales of teamwork.

For one thing, the Iliad shows how difficult teamwork can be and how essential to success it is. The epic underlines the many ways teams can fail and how important it is to steer them to those narrower avenues that lead victory. In the story, Agamemnon disrespects Achilles, his best warrior, taking his slave girl as his own. Needless to add, this creates a great deal of conflict between the two allies. The erosion of trust between the two leads to tragic ends.

Related: The Dangers of Self-Serving Bias at the Workplace

The Iliad is many things, and to simplify it as merely a parable about teamwork would be to do the classic a disservice. That doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be read and appreciated on many levels, including what it can tell us, in the most dramatic ways, about teamwork examples and the importance of not acting selfishly and risking the loyalty of the team.

8. The Growth of Marvel Comics

We’re not talking about the teamwork of fictional Marvel comic creations, such as the Avengers, X-Men or the Fantastic Four, though we could. But more interesting than the superheroes are the super-talented teams that worked to create the comic books that have gone on to movie stardom.

There were writers, like the famous Stan Lee, who often came up with an idea that the penciler, someone like Jack Kirby (Captain America, the Hulk, etc.) or Steve Ditko (Spider-Man and Doctor Strange) would then block out in pages of dramatic sequential drawings. Then the boards would go to a letterer and inker before a colorist would add the primary colors. These would then be sent to a printer, distributed and sold at the local drug store or comic book shop.

Each step of this process had to be carefully planned among all parties, of course, but there would also be a collaboration between writers and artists as they developed characters and conflicts to add drama to the stories. Teamwork kept the gears well-greased and their work has since elevated “silly kids stuff” into the mythology of the future.

9. The Constitution of the United States

The Constitution of the United States is a foundational document of our democracy. It is also a prime example of teamwork. The then 13 states, all of which would have to ratify the constitution to make it the law of the land, were not united. There was no central government and the risk of the new nation falling apart was even more of a concern than it is today!

Debates raged over such things that we today take for granted like how long a president’s term should last. For four months delegates debated, until on September 17, 1787, the 39 delegates signed the historic document. Of course, that wasn’t the end of it. Now voters in each state had to approve. But the delegates did their job and the people ratified the Constitution in 1789. Because of its significance and the number of people involved, the creation and ratification of the Constitution is without a doubt one of the best teamwork examples in United States history.

10. The Wright Brothers

Wilbur and Orville Wright’s journey to invent the first successful powered airplane is a classic teamwork example of overcoming daunting challenges. Rather than working in isolation, the brothers combined their unique strengths–Wilbur’s strategic vision and Orville’s practical engineering skills–to solve the complex problems of flight. Their partnership was characterized by constant communication, mutual respect and a willingness to learn from failure, allowing them to refine their designs rapidly and efficiently.

Their collaborative approach extended beyond the workshop, as they studied the work of others, shared findings and supported each other through setbacks. In 1903, their teamwork culminated in the first controlled, powered flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, revolutionizing transportation and changing the course of history. The Wright brothers’ story is a testament to how trust, shared determination and complementary skills can turn an ambitious dream into reality.

11. The 2010 Chilean Miners Rescue

In August 2010, 33 miners were trapped 2,300 feet underground after a catastrophic collapse at the San José mine in Chile. The situation was dire, with the world watching anxiously as the miners’ lives hung in the balance. Immediately, a massive collaborative effort began above ground, involving engineers, geologists, medical personnel, government officials and international experts. They formed a unified command center, pooling knowledge and resources to devise a rescue strategy that had never been attempted before. Each team brought its unique expertise and together, they brainstormed, problem-solved and made critical decisions under intense pressure and scrutiny.

Below ground, the miners themselves demonstrated a remarkable teamwork example, rationing supplies, maintaining morale and supporting one another through the ordeal. After 69 days, all 33 miners were brought safely to the surface, an outcome made possible by extraordinary collaboration at every level. The Chilean miners’ rescue remains a testament to the power of teamwork in overcoming seemingly insurmountable challenges, showing how unity, trust and shared purpose can save lives and inspire the world.

12. Charles Plumb and the Parachute Packer

Charles Plumb, a U.S. Navy jet fighter pilot during the Vietnam War, completed 75 combat missions before being shot down and captured. Years after his release, Plumb was approached by a stranger who recognized him and revealed, “I packed your parachute.” Plumb realized that, while he was celebrated for his flying skills, his survival depended on the meticulous, unseen teamwork of others–like the sailor who packed his parachute with care and precision.

This encounter profoundly impacted Plumb, reminding him that every achievement is built on the collective efforts of many, not just the visible few. It’s a teamwork example that highlights the importance of recognizing and valuing every team member’s contribution, no matter how behind-the-scenes. True teamwork means understanding that everyone’s role—big or small—is vital to the group’s ultimate success and survival.

How ProjectManager Helps With Teamwork

ProjectManager is award-winning project management software that prioritizes teamwork. Regardless of how your team prefers to work, from Gantt charts to dashboards, our software can do it all. The best part is that data automatically populates across the software across project views, making it easy to collaborate and stay connected with your team.

Teamwork is not having one person force their way on the others: it’s about being open to compromise. All parties involved must find common ground and work together because the end result is something all can benefit from. Just like the Constitution, which has been amended over the years as times and attitudes change, teamwork must be a fluid process, not etched in stone, but always open and willing to improve.

Teamwork is inspiring! It exhibits our ability to overcome personal issues for a collective objective. ProjectManager is online project management software that fosters teamwork. From collaborative scheduling features like an online Gantt chart to Kanban boards to sharing workflow with teams, ProjectManager makes teamwork fun and easy. See what your team thinks by taking this free 30-day trial.

The post 12 Inspirational Teamwork Examples appeared first on ProjectManager.

Use this roundup of free meeting agenda templates for Word and Excel to make it easier to plan and execute efficient meetings. They can be used repeatedly to consistently improve collaboration, accountability and overall meeting effectiveness—without the extra time spent creating documents from scratch.

1. Meeting Agenda Template

Download this free meeting agenda template for Word, which outlines the structure and key elements of a meeting. It includes sections for the meeting title, date and time, participants, agenda items, time allocations for each item and more. By providing a consistent format, meeting agenda templates help organizers prepare thoroughly and ensure meetings stay focused and productive.

Meeting templates benefit the organizer and participants by setting clear expectations in advance. It helps prioritize discussion points, manage time efficiently and track follow-ups after the meeting. Whether used for internal team meetings, client discussions or strategic planning sessions, good meeting agenda templates foster better communication and collaboration by keeping everyone aligned on goals and responsibilities.

Meetings end with action items. Turn them into actionable plans with project management software. ProjectManager is award-winning project and portfolio management software with robust Gantt charts that can schedule tasks, resources and cost. To ensure the work is done on time, users can link all four types of task dependencies to avoid delays and cost overruns. Filter for the critical path to identify essential tasks and slack, then set a baseline to track progress in real time. Get started with ProjectManager today for free.

2. Meeting Minutes Template

Use this free meeting minutes template for Word to record the key points, decisions and action items discussed during a meeting. It includes fields for the meeting date and time, attendees, agenda items, key takeaways and when the next meeting will be scheduled. This meeting agenda template ensures that all critical information is documented consistently and can be easily referenced by anyone involved in the meeting.

Using meeting minutes templates streamlines the note-taking process and improves accountability. It provides a record of who said what, what was agreed upon and what needs to happen next. This supports better follow-up and task tracking and helps maintain transparency and alignment within teams or with stakeholders. Whether for internal team syncs or formal board meetings, meeting templates ensure nothing important is missed or forgotten.

3. Meeting Action Items Template

This free action items template captures and tracks tasks that arise during meetings, planning sessions or project discussions. Meeting agenda templates like this include fields such as a description of the task, the person responsible, the due date, priority level and status. This standardized format ensures that everyone involved knows exactly what needs to be done, by whom and by when, reducing confusion and helping teams stay organized and accountable.

Using team meeting templates improves follow-through and supports effective collaboration by making responsibilities and deadlines visible to all stakeholders. It also serves as a running log of progress and decisions, making it easier to review past work or prepare for upcoming meetings. Whether managing a small team or coordinating across departments, an action items template helps keep momentum going and ensures the assigned work is completed on time.

4. Action Plan Template

The free action plan template for Excel outlines the steps needed to complete the action items from a meeting, achieve a goal or complete a project. It includes tasks or actions, assigned team members, deadlines, required resources and costs. By laying out each step clearly, these meeting agenda templates help teams break down complex objectives into manageable tasks, promoting efficiency and accountability throughout the process.

Using an action plan template ensures that everyone involved in a project understands their responsibilities and the timeline for completion. It supports clear communication, helps track progress and allows project managers to identify bottlenecks or areas that need adjustment. These meeting agenda templates are great for launching a new product, organizing an event or improving internal processes, keeping efforts focused and aligned toward the end goal.

5. Decision Matrix Template

No roundup of meeting agenda templates would be complete without this free decision matrix template for Excel. They evaluate and compare different options based on predefined criteria, which can be critical during a meeting. It works by allowing users to assign weights to each criterion according to its importance and rate each option against these criteria. The weighted scores are then tallied, providing a clear, objective way to identify the most suitable choice. This method is especially useful for complex decisions that involve multiple variables and stakeholders.

A decision matrix template with meeting agenda templates helps remove bias from the decision-making process by introducing a transparent and repeatable framework. It also promotes collaboration, as teams can discuss and agree on the importance of each criterion and the scores assigned to each option during the meeting. They’re ideal for selecting a vendor, choosing between project strategies or evaluating new software tools.

6. Decision Log Template

Download our free decision log template for Excel to record key decisions made throughout a project or during meetings. It includes information such as the decision description, date, responsible parties, rationale and any supporting details. By capturing this information consistently, teams can maintain a reliable record of why and how decisions were made, making it easier to reference later if questions or issues arise.

A decision log template complements meeting agenda templates as it helps improve transparency, accountability and alignment among team members and stakeholders. It ensures that important decisions are not forgotten or misunderstood and provides continuity for those who may join the project at a later stage. Additionally, a well-maintained decision log supports better project governance by offering an audit trail that can be revisited during reviews or lessons-learned sessions.

7. Decision Tree Template

This free decision tree template is a visual tool that maps potential choices and their possible outcomes in a tree-like diagram. Each branch of the tree represents a decision or an event, allowing teams to explore different scenarios, assess risks and weigh the consequences of various paths. By laying out options in a structured format, decision tree templates help clarify complex problems and support more informed, logical decision-making.

It works with meeting agenda templates because in meetings, the decision tree template enhances collaboration and discussion. It makes the decision-making process more transparent and participatory. They allow teams to visually follow how a decision may unfold, anticipate challenges and agree on the most beneficial course of action. This clarity can reduce misunderstandings, streamline debate and lead to faster, more confident consensus among stakeholders.

8. Meeting To-Do List Template

Use a to-do list template for Excel to capture, organize and track tasks that must be completed. It’s formatted with columns for task descriptions, deadlines, priority levels and responsible parties. These meeting agenda templates help ensure that action items are documented and not forgotten. By using a consistent layout, teams can maintain accountability and stay aligned on what needs to be done, by whom and by when.

In meetings, a to-do list template is a practical tool for recording tasks that arise during discussions. It ensures that key follow-ups are documented in real time and provides a reference point for reviewing progress in future meetings. This improves continuity across meetings, helps prevent miscommunication and fosters a results-oriented culture by turning ideas and decisions into actionable next steps.

9. Lessons Learned Template

The free lessons learned template for Excel captures insights, experiences and key takeaways from a project or a specific phase of work. It includes sections for what went well, what didn’t go as planned and suggestions for improvement. By organizing this feedback in a standardized way, meeting agenda templates help project teams reflect on their performance, document best practices and identify opportunities to avoid past mistakes in future projects.

These meeting agenda templates are especially helpful in post-project reviews or retrospectives. Lessons learned templates guide the discussion and ensure all relevant points are covered. It helps participants focus on constructive feedback and provides a formal record of the team’s reflections. This promotes a culture of continuous improvement and serves as a valuable knowledge-sharing tool for future teams working on similar initiatives.

10. Progress Report Template

Download this free progress report template for Word to track and communicate the current status of a project. It includes key sections such as completed tasks, ongoing activities, upcoming milestones, challenges faced and any deviations from the original plan. These meeting templates help ensure that all team members and stakeholders receive consistent updates, which promotes alignment and transparency throughout the project lifecycle.

In a project meeting, a progress report template serves as a structured agenda item that guides discussion and decision-making. It keeps conversations focused on measurable outcomes and helps identify any issues that need immediate attention. By presenting clear, concise updates, meeting agenda templates like this foster accountability and ensure everyone is on the same page about project timelines, deliverables and goals.

ProjectManager Manages Meetings and Their Aftermath

Meeting agenda templates are helpful, but they’re also limited. These are, after all, static documents. They can’t notify participants or turn action items into actionable plans. They’re not even collaborative, which is essential in a meeting.

ProjectManager has powerful Gantt charts, as we’ve shown above, but also multiple project views so everyone can work how they want, including on kanban boards, sheet, calendar or task list views. Recurring tasks can be set up with email and in-app notifications to ensure no one misses a meeting. There are also features to help run better meetings.

Get Real-Time Metrics With Tailored Dashboards

Projects run on data and so do the best project meetings. Team members don’t want to waste time. They need to know where they are about where they should be according to the plan. Our real-time project and portfolio dashboards are constantly updating with live data and display it on easy-to-read graphs and charts that show time, cost, workload and more. These visual presentations help make complex data easy and quick to digest.

Use Customizable Reports for More Detail

When the meeting needs to delve deeper into the data, our customizable reports on status, variance, workload, timesheets and more provide that information. Each of these reports can be filtered to focus on key data points of interest to the meeting. They can also provide a high-level overview of progress and be shared in various formats to keep stakeholders informed.

Related Meeting Content

Meeting agenda templates are helpful, but they’re only part of the larger process of having successful meetings. Learn how to run meetings and more by reading the following articles from our ProjectManager blog.

• How to Run Team Meetings: Tips & Best Practices
• 10 Project Meetings to Guide Your Project Management Team
• Meeting Planning Steps: How to Plan a Meeting
• Project Kickoff Meeting: How to Write a Kickoff Meeting Agenda

ProjectManager is online project and portfolio management software that connects teams whether they’re in the office or out in the field. They can share files, comment at the task level and stay updated with email and in-app notifications. Join teams at Avis, Nestle and Siemens who use our software to deliver successful projects. Get started with ProjectManager today for free.

The post 10 Free Meeting Agenda Templates for Word and Excel appeared first on ProjectManager.

ProjectManager is project management software that helps you manage projects and stakeholders. If you’re not ready for a free trial of the software, we also offer dozens of free project management templates for Excel and Word that can help with every phase of your project. Here are some free stakeholder management templates.

1. Stakeholder Analysis Template

There may be many stakeholders in any project, but your job as a project manager is to identify them. Each stakeholder can have a different interest or those interests can evolve over the course of the project. Using our free stakeholder analysis template for Excel helps you devise an effective stakeholder communication plan to keep them properly informed.

There are fields to capture basic stakeholder information, including their title, contact information and influence or power over the project. Then you can place each stakeholder as they stand in relation to the project, noting their priority, if they have subject matter expertise and whether they’re decision-makers. Then you can assess each stakeholder’s commitment to the project and better manage them.

2. Project Status Report Template

Stakeholders need to stay informed throughout the project. Depending on the stakeholder, however, that level of information and the frequency in which they’re updated can change. Whether they need details or just an overview, project managers still must report regularly. Using our free project status report template for Excel is a great tool to capture a period of time in the project.

The trouble with a static template is that it has to be manually updated and the information can’t be customized to reflect each stakeholder’s concerns.

Take Stakeholder Management Online With ProjectManager

Unlike static tools, ProjectManager is an online software that delivers real-time data. Reports can be filtered to show only the information relevant to each stakeholder.

• Generate reports on status, variance and more in a keystroke
• Share reports in a variety of customizable formats
• Free guest licenses for stakeholders offer real-time insights via dashboards and schedules. Try it free

3. Stakeholder Map Template

If you’re looking for a visual tool that can help you identify and chart your stakeholders, then you need to download our free stakeholder map template for Excel. You can use the stakeholder map to inform your decision-making when dealing with stakeholders. It’s essential to establishing a viable stakeholder communication plan.

The stakeholder map template helps you to determine who wants to know what, when they need to know it and how they prefer to get their updates. This stakeholder map has four categories for managing your stakeholders: manage closely, keep satisfied, keep informed and monitor. Place each stakeholder you identify in the correct box and use color coding to show if they’re supportive, neutral or critical to the project.

4. Stakeholder Register Template

A stakeholder register is an easy and streamlined way to lay out the information to better understand each stakeholder, their influence and the best way to manage them. Download this free stakeholder register template for Excel to help outline stakeholders and how they may impact the project.

Ideally, use this template during the project’s planning stage to identify stakeholders as early as possible. However, it can also help form and develop the project team to ensure the right people are selected. It’s also useful to use to define success criteria, helping project managers align objectives with stakeholder expectations.

5. Business Case Template

Since stakeholders have a vested interest in the project, one of the things they’re most concerned about is the costs related to executing the project. They want to know if the investment costs are worth it. You can show them this with our free business case template for Word, which summarizes project objectives, costs and benefits.

The business case is important due diligence for stakeholders by proving that their investment in the project is beneficial. They can read an executive summary, the mission statement for the project and the final deliverable that’ll be produced. There’s a place to show the project objectives and how they’ll be achieved, the financial appraisal and market assessment plus more. It’ll help get buy-in from stakeholders.

6. Cost-Benefit Analysis Template

Another free template that can help prove to stakeholders that the project is worth their investment is our free cost-benefit analysis template for Excel. It helps you look at the numbers and determine if the money you’re putting into the project is worth the deliverables.

A cost-benefit analysis template does this by adding a dollar amount to the project’s costs and benefits. By subtracting the benefits from the costs you can see what the profit if any, is for the project. This can be financial gains, but it can also determine if the business objectives and goals are worth the costs. This information can help get stakeholders on board with the project.

7. RACI Matrix

It’s clearly important to identify and define the roles and responsibilities of your project team, but often project managers will neglect the same exercise when dealing with project stakeholders. After that, your project team is just one of likely many stakeholders in the project. Using our free RACI matrix template for Excel allows you to categorize everyone involved in the project, including stakeholders.

RACI stands for responsible, accountable, consulted and informed. On our free template, you list all the stakeholders (or the entire project team) on the left side, while atop the chart is their title. In the corresponding box, you note if they’re responsible, accountable, consulted or informed. Now you have a document to guide everyone on the team, including stakeholders, who have different levels of involvement and impact on the project.

8. Skills Matrix Template

Another free stakeholder management template is the skills matrix template for Excel. Stakeholders want to ensure the project team has the needed skills to deliver the intended outcomes on time, on budget and to the required quality standards. This free template can help you do just that.

This template captures relevant details like department and job roles to highlight areas of expertise and areas where critical skills are missing. Use it to ensure the right people are assigned to the right tasks, balance workloads and avoid bottlenecks.

9. Requirements Gathering Template

Stakeholders want to know the problems being solved by the project, how it plans to achieve its objective, what condition or capacity must be met and more. That’s all addressed in our free requirements gathering template for Word. This is a key document for stakeholders and captures vital information about the project in one place.

There’s a lot covered in the free template. It lists the project requirements, from user, functional and system to software, interface, workflow, change and risks. This is more of a high-level view, which is appropriate for most stakeholders and avoids getting into the weeds. There’s even a section for everyone to sign off on the document to ensure they’re informed and in agreement.

10. Team Charter Template

Team members are stakeholders, though not the only ones in a project. The free team charter template for Word is mostly focused on them, but it’s another essential stakeholder management template. It explains how the team fits into the larger context of the project, such as the project stakeholders.

Besides that, the free charter lists everyone involved in the project and provides contact information. There’s a section to outline the background of the project, its mission and objective, budget and resources and the decision-making process used by the team. There’s information on scope, performance assessments, activities and milestones and much more. It’s a great tool to communicate and get everyone on board with the project.

11. Communication Plan Template

Speaking of communication, you need a communication plan to get information to your project team. Using our free communication plan template for Word will help you define objectives and schedule communication updates with stakeholders. It’s one of the more important stakeholder management templates in that a well-informed stakeholder is easier to manage and less likely to interfere in the project.

Besides objectives, the communication plan template helps you define how you’ll achieve those objectives, in what timeframe and with what metrics to measure your success. You’ll figure out the staffing and tools associated with disseminating information as well as reviewing its effectiveness. Once you have a plan, it’s apt to change in order to remain relevant and effective.

12. Organizational Chart Template

While it might not seem like a key stakeholder management template, knowing the organizational makeup of a company or project is how everyone in the organization or project team knows to who they report. Use our free organizational chart template for Excel. It’s a flowchart that shows the hierarchical internal structure of an organization or project.

This document is an easy-to-digest visual of the chain of command. While smaller organizations, such as startups, or projects might not need the tool, the larger and more complex the organization or project is, the more essential this stakeholder management template becomes. It’s imperative that everyone knows who they report to and who has authority, which is exactly what this template illustrates.

13. Transition Plan Template

Stakeholders will want to know that any transitions will be handled smoothly. A transition plan is a set of steps, goals and timelines to better prepare for change. This document offers a structure and framework to create a unique plan to help teams identify and address potential risks and uncertainties during a transition. This free transition template for Excel saves time and streamlines the process.

Transitions can be stressful, but having a template makes the process easier. It’s especially useful to use when the project is shifting from one phase to another or when there’s a change in someone’s role or project. For example, leverage it when a team member is leaving a role to help inform what duties will change and who to inform.

ProjectManager Helps With Stakeholder Management

Once you’ve downloaded and used our free stakeholder management templates, you’ll quickly find that they can take you only so far. Templates, after all, much be manually inputted and updated, they’re not collaborative and are isolated from the rest of your project management tools. ProjectManager is project management software that helps you plan, manage and track your stakeholder management in real time.

Share Project Plans With Stakeholders

Projects need plans, but plans don’t work without your stakeholders. Creating a schedule on our robust Gantt charts allows you to manage the stakeholders on your project team, organize their tasks, link dependencies to avoid costly delays and assign them to work that you can track in real time. The project plan can be easily shared with the project team and stakeholders to keep everyone on the same page.

Monitor Progress and Performance in Real Time

Once you set a baseline on the Gantt, you can track your planned effort against your actual effort. Not only does this help you keep to your schedule and budget, but stakeholders want to be updated on that valuable data as well. The real-time dashboard requires no setup, as with lightweight tools, and tracks everything from workload to cost and time in easy-to-read graphs and charts. It’s a great way to get a high-level view of the project whenever you want.

Project managers can use resource management features to keep their teams productive. Availability can be set in advance to make scheduling simpler and our color-coded workload chart helps you see your team’s allocation. You can then balance their workload from the chart to keep them working at capacity. They’re not overallocated and stakeholders are happy to see productivity.

Related Content

If that’s not enough stakeholder management for you, our site is loaded with free content. There are weekly blogs, guides, videos, and, of course, more free project management templates for Excel and Word. Here are some resources to learn more about stakeholder management.

• Stakeholder Management Guide
• Stakeholder Analysis 101
• What Is Stakeholder Theory
• Stakeholder vs. Shareholder: What’s the Difference?
• Stakeholder Mapping 101: A Quick Guide to Stakeholder Maps

ProjectManager is award-winning project management software that empowers teams to work better together. Task management tools add to productive and risk management features to help you identify, track and mitigate risk. Join teams at Avis, Nestle and Siemens who are delivering success with our software. Get started with ProjectManager today for free.

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You use a project brief, an important document that outlines what the project is about, to do just that. A project brief lets you convey the main goals of the project so that everyone understands what they’ll be doing.

Read on to learn more about them, and how to make one for yourself. There’s even a free template and in-depth example of a project brief for a construction project to help you get started.

What Is a Project Brief?

A project brief communicates the reason and approach for a project and the processes that will be used to manage it. It’s not as detailed as a project plan, though it’s up there in importance.

Stakeholders and the project team need a short and concise pitch to explain the project. The project brief is a way to deliver this information in a summary that will outline the objectives of the project, its scope, the main deliverables, milestones and the timeline.

Taking the time to create a thorough project brief helps bring everyone together to better fulfill the mandate of the project. It will also set the stage for a better plan and project schedule. The better your project brief, the better you’ll achieve the goals and objectives of the project.

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Project Brief Template

Use this free Project Brief Template for Word to manage your projects better.

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What Is the Purpose of a Project Brief?

The project brief does more than frame the project—it also acts as an effective communication tool. A strong project brief helps stakeholders, teams, designers and anyone involved in the project understand its requirements and goal. It’s a key document at the initiation of a project, in that it brings everyone together to serve a common end.

It is not an exaggeration to say the project brief is the most crucial document to leading a successful project. It is here that you define the scope of the project and open the door to a conversation between all parties involved in getting to the goal most efficiently.

In practical terms, the project brief will make clear what your client’s objectives are, who the target audience or market for the product or service is, and even the key competitors in that space.

Who Creates a Project Brief?

Because it’s such a fundamental document in any project, the project brief is created by the project manager. The project manager is responsible for creating the project plan and schedule, as well as managing resources, so it’s only natural that they are involved in the creation of the project brief as it will guide all those other project components.

However, a project manager doesn’t pull the information contained in the project brief out of their hat. Like producing the project plan and schedule, there are resources a project manager will tap to make sure the document accurately captures the project’s mission.

The first and among the most key people to speak to, naturally, are the client and project stakeholders. They are the ones for whom the project exists and can define its goals and objectives.

Once the vision is clear, project managers can refer back to older projects for historical data that can help guide the direction of this new project. Similarly, input from other project managers and project team members who have run similar projects can be very helpful.

While the buck stops with the project manager, a lot of cooks are in this kitchen. The more research and preparation are done before the pencil hits the paper, the better the results, which will set the tone for the entire project that follows.

What Should a Project Brief Include?

The project brief is a bit of an oxymoron. It must describe the whole project thoroughly while at the same time offering only a summary. It’s not so different from an executive summary, in that it acts somewhere between an elevator pitch and the overview of an agenda.

While project briefs can vary in format, most will touch on these topics.

• Title
• Client (contact info, type of business and customer base)
• Project Definition (background, outcomes, scope)
• Project Approach (processes and procedures)
• Project Objective
• Project Details (target audience, goals, timeline, phase, review, etc.)

Key Elements of a Project Brief

While we briefly touched on what to include in a project brief, let’s delve deeper into some key elements.

• Project title and description: Ensure the title is clear and concise. Include a summary of the project, its purpose and the problem it aims to solve.
• Goals and objectives: Include the desired outcomes the project wants to achieve. The objectives should have SMART targets, or specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.
• Project scope: Define what the project will and won’t include to manage expectations and prevent scope creep.
• Key deliverables: Tangible or intangible outcomes that the project will produce.
• Project timeline: Include start and end dates, key milestones, checkpoints and expected completion dates.
• Stakeholders: Identify who have a vested interest in the project or can influence the outcome. Be sure to note the core project team members alongside their roles and responsibilities.
• Budgets and resources: Provide a high-level overview of the allocated budget as well as specific resources like equipment, personnel and materials.
• Constraints: What that could impact the budget, such as budget limitations, strict deadlines or scarce resources?
• Success criteria: Define how project success will be measured and evaluated when finished.

Project Brief Template

Let’s take a look at a project brief and see one in which to get all those elements to come together on a page. ProjectManager has lots of free templates for every aspect of project management, including a free project brief template. You can see that everything is laid out clearly and cleanly. The project name is up top, as is the date the project brief was created, information on the client and an overview of the project itself.

The goals and objects are described, constraints and assumptions are given and the project scope is detailed. You can also add the target audience and who is authorized to deem the project a success and by what criteria.

After that follows more details about executing the project, such as the budget, timeline, duration and milestones.

How to Create a Project Brief

When you write a project brief you have to incorporate the background, the objectives of the project and what will determine if it’s a success. There needs to be an outline of the project’s schedule and target audience.

At its simplest, a project brief can answer those questions and serve its purpose. You can list the sections as bullet points on a one-page document or if it’s a digital link to supporting documentation. There is no one way to create a project brief, but the following is a general guide to how to get started:

Project Overview

Begin by collecting the contact information. It’s a good and easy start. Jot down the client, their contract, a brief about their business and customer base. Having a solid background will inform the rest of your business brief.

Project Objectives

Knowing what your project objectives are is how you get a better understanding of the project at large. Look at what deliverables you have, especially the final one. This is also how you begin to define what a successful project looks like. Use SMART goals, as in being specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound.

Project Timeline

You’ve defined what you have to deliver, now you need to figure out the timeframe in which you have to make those deliverables. This means knowing when you’re going to start and what the project’s timeline is. What you’re undertaking here is the T in SMART, the time-bound part. To further refine the schedule, look at milestones (important dates, like when one phase ends and another begins).

Who’s the Target Audience?

The project brief is more than just what you’re doing and when you’re doing it, you need to outline who you’re doing it for. Without a target audience, you can’t define whether your project is a success or not. You can get it all done on time and within budget and still fail because you didn’t deliver on the quality expectations of your target audience. That means demographics and other profiling to make sure you’re fulfilling that audience’s needs.

Tie It to the Stakeholders & Team

Finally, you want to tie all the pieces to the stakeholders and the team, who are the target audience for the project brief. That means, making it relevant to them by including resources for the project, outlining the budget, even a communication plan and defining the roles and responsibilities. How much more you want to add is up to you, but it should strike a good balance between what’s important and what’s too in the weeds. Remember, you don’t want to obscure your message.

Construction Project Brief Example

For a better understanding of a project brief, let’s look at a construction project brief example.

Project Title and Description

Project Title: Aspen Creek Townhomes Development

Description: This construction project involves the construction of a new residential development consisting of 10 modern, two-story townhome units on a currently vacant 1.5-acre site located at 123 Main Street, Aspen Creek, Colorado. The development aims to provide high-quality, energy-efficient housing options for families and individuals in the growing Aspen Creek community.

Project Goals and Objectives

Goals

• To deliver a high-quality residential development that meets the housing needs of the Aspen Creek community.
• To achieve a profitable return on investment for the developer.
• To establish a positive reputation for the construction company within the local market.

Objectives

• Complete the construction of all ten townhome units within 12 months from project commencement.
• Adhere to the approved architectural plans and specifications, ensuring high-quality construction standards.
• Achieve a minimum energy efficiency rating of “Energy Star Certified” for each unit.
• Maintain the project budget of $2,500,000, with a contingency of 5%.
• Secure all necessary permits and approvals from the City of Aspen Creek promptly.
• Achieve a 90% pre-sale rate of the townhomes before project completion.

Project Scope

Inclusions

• Site preparation, including clearing, grading, and utility connections (water, sewer, gas, electricity).
• Construction of ten (10) individual two-story townhome units, each approximately 1,800 sq ft with 3 bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms.
• Installation of all interior finishes (flooring, paint, fixtures, appliances).
• Landscaping of common areas and individual unit yards.
• Construction of on-site parking spaces (two per unit plus visitor parking).

Exclusions

• Off-site infrastructure improvements beyond the property boundary.
• Sales and marketing activities (handled by a separate real estate agency).
• Homeowner association (HOA) establishment and management.
• Customization requests from individual buyers during construction (unless explicitly approved via change order).

Key Deliverables

• Approved architectural and engineering drawings.
• Secured building permits and other necessary approvals.
• Completed and inspected foundation for all units.
• Erected and structurally sound framing for all units.
• Installed and functioning building systems (electrical, plumbing, HVAC).
• Completed exterior finishes (siding, roofing, windows, doors).
• Completed interior finishes (flooring, paint, fixtures, appliances).
• Landscaped common areas and individual yards.
• Completed on-site parking and access roads.
• Final inspection approvals from the City of Aspen Creek.
• As-built drawings and relevant warranties.

Project Timeline and Milestones

Project Start Date: May 15, 2025

Estimated Project End Date: May 15, 2026

Key Milestones

• Permit Approval: June 30, 2025
• Foundation Completion: August 31, 2025
• Framing Completion: November 30, 2025
• Building Systems Installation: February 28, 2026
• Exterior Finishes Completion: March 31, 2026
• Interior Finishes Completion: April 30, 2026
• Final Inspections: May 10, 2026
• Project Completion & Handover: May 15, 2026

Key Stakeholders and Team Members

Key Stakeholders

• Developer (Aspen Creek Development Group)
• Construction Company (BuildRight Construction – Project Lead)
• City of Aspen Creek Planning and Building Department
• Potential Homebuyers
• Local Community

Core Project Team Members

• Project Manager (BuildRight Construction) – [John Smith]
• Site Superintendent (BuildRight Construction) – [Kevin Gardner]
• Lead Architect – [Danny Murphy]
• Structural Engineer – [B&B Engineering, LLC.]

Project Budget and Resources

Total Budget: $2,500,000

Contingency: $125,000 (5% of total budget)

Key Resource Categories

• Labor (various trades)
• Materials (lumber, concrete, roofing, finishes, etc.)
• Equipment (excavators, cranes, etc.)
• Subcontractors (electrical, plumbing, HVAC)

Success Criteria

• Completion of all ten townhome units within the agreed-upon 12-month timeframe.
• Adherence to the project budget, remaining within the $2,500,000 allocation plus contingency.
• Successful attainment of “Energy Star Certified” rating for each unit.
• Positive feedback from the City of Aspen Creek on the quality of construction and adherence to regulations.
• Achievement of at least an 80% pre-sale rate by the substantial completion date.

Constraints and Assumptions

Constraints

• Strict adherence to City of Aspen Creek building codes and zoning regulations.
• Potential weather delays during the winter months (November – March).
• Availability of skilled labor within the local market.

Assumptions

• Timely approval of all required permits and inspections by the City of Aspen Creek.
• No significant unforeseen site conditions (e.g., soil contamination) will be encountered.
• Material prices will remain within the current market range.

Risks and Challenges (Optional but Recommended)

• Potential delays in material deliveries due to supply chain disruptions.
• Unexpected increases in labor costs.
• Delays in permit approvals from the city.

This project brief example for construction will act as a guide for the project team and stakeholders throughout the planning and execution phases.

Things to Avoid when Making a Project Brief

There are common mistakes people make when crafting their project brief; let’s take a quick look at those mistakes below.

• Biting Off More Than You Can Chew: Be on the lookout for pitfalls such as defining too many goals. The project brief needs to be, well, brief and too many goals will not only make it longer but harder to understand.
• Confusing Communication: Clarity is key to a successful project brief. If you aren’t clear when defining your target audience, then the project sights will be off from the start. Even if the aim is only a little off, over the course of the project the effect will be cumulative and your final deliverable will be well off the mark.
• Lack of Precision: Another thing to avoid is generalizations. Good writing is specific, and a well-written project brief shares the same precision. Avoid jargon and any meaningless filling. Say what you want is a few, well-pointed words that describe what you’re talking about, putting it in focus.
• Phoning It In: Finally, don’t be lazy. Put in the work. Do all the research, talk to everyone you need to in order to deliver a strong project brief. This is a foundational document that leads to the project plan, but it’s also a communication tool. If you don’t have a clear project brief, the rest of the project will suffer.

How ProjectManager Enables Successful Projects

ProjectManager is an award-winning project management software that turns a brief into a successful project. With features that can plan, monitor and report on progress and performance, you’ll only need one software to manage all aspects of your project.

All the tasks that lead to deliverables in the project brief need to get done within the timeframe and budget you estimated. To control all these elements, we have an online Gantt chart project view. It organizes your tasks and subtasks, resources and costs.

Task Lists for Easy Execution

Now you have your tasks laid out, but tasks need people to execute them and move your project forward. You can direct your team to use our task lists, which list out your task descriptions and file attachments. Then, they can work together, commenting at the task level with other team members, who are notified by email.

Track Projects with Automated Dashboards

You can keep track of their progress with great monitoring features, such as a real-time dashboard that displays task status, costs and other high-level views of the project. Our software calculates task updates and displays them in color-coded charts and graphs, perfect to share at stakeholder meetings to keep them in the loop.

ProjectManager is a cloud-based software that organizes tasks, teams and projects. It helps you turn your project brief into a project plan, scheduling tasks on a Gantt chart and giving teams kanban boards to visualize their workload. Real-time dashboards and one-click reporting keep you on track and stakeholders updated. See for yourself by taking this free 30-day trial.

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What Is a Project Budget?

A project budget is the total projected costs needed to complete a project over a defined period of time. It’s used to estimate what the costs of the project will be for every phase of the project. Creating a project budget is a critical part of the project planning process.

The project budget will include such things as labor costs, material procurement costs and operating costs. But it’s not a static document. Your project budget will be reviewed and revived throughout the project, hopefully with the help of project budgeting software.

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Use this free Project Budget Template to manage your projects better.

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Why You Need a Project Budget

The obvious answer is that projects cost money, but it’s more nuanced than that. The project budget is the engine that drives your project’s funding. It communicates to stakeholders how much money is needed and when it’s needed. Project budgets are important for any industry such as construction, marketing or manufacturing, for example.

But a project budget is not only a means to get things that your project requires. Yes, you need to pay teams, buy or rent equipment and materials, but that’s only half the story. The other part of the importance of a project budget is that it’s an instrument to control project costs. The budget, which is part of your project plan, acts as a baseline to measure your performance as you collect the actual costs once the project has been started.

Who Is Involved in Setting and Managing a Project Budget?

Several key stakeholders are typically involved in setting and managing project budgets. First, the project sponsor (such as a senior executive or manager) will secure and approve the initial project funding. They outline the project’s financial expectations and limitations. The sponsor also has the authority to approve major budget revisions or the allocation of contingency funds.

Then, the project manager will develop a detailed budget. They create a budget plan and break down the project scope and estimate costs for tasks, resources and deliverables. They will manage the budget throughout the project and provide regular financial reports to the sponsor and other stakeholders. The project team may also be involved, as team members with specific expertise can contribute to estimating the costs associated with their tasks and required resources.

What Is Project Budgeting?

Project budgeting is the process of estimating the full cost of the project from the very beginning until the end. The project budgeting process involves the following:

• Budget planning: Estimating costs and making a budget based on a project estimate
• Budget tracking: Keeping track of project expenses during the project execution phase
• Project budget management: Setting guidelines and control procedures to guarantee that costs don’t exceed the project budget

Project Budgeting Approaches

There are four project budgeting approaches: analogous, parametric, top-down and bottom-up. Analogous is an estimating technique that uses historical data to help determine the cost of the current project. It looks at past projects that are similar to figure out the cost and duration of the new project. This is a popular choice when there’s little data available for the project, making accurate estimates difficult.

Parametric estimating is a statistical approach to estimating the time, cost and resources for a project. It uses historical data, but also statistical data, to make a more accurate estimate. Top-down estimating is when the organization sets the cost and/or the duration of the project. With that figure in mind, the project manager seeks expert opinions to help determine the budget. Finally, bottom-up estimating is working from the lowest possible level of detail. It builds up the estimate from the work package.

What Is Project Budget Management?

Project budget management is a process by which the finances related to the project are administered and overseen. It goes beyond estimating the cost of completing the project and includes tracking those costs and much more. Some of the aspects of project budget management include how you’ll estimate the cost of the project and how those costs will be spread across the life cycle of the project. You’ll need to determine the metrics and the method by which you’ll track those costs to keep to the budget.

Reporting on the budget is also part of project budget management, including how you’ll do it and the frequency with which you’ll do it. If you find you’re going over budget, you’ll need to come up with a plan to rein the budget back in. You’ll even need to define a process of learning from historical data.

Project management software simplifies project budgeting and project budget management. Take ProjectManager; all you have to do is open up the settings on your Gantt and set a budget baseline. Now you have the planned effort saved and you can use budget tracking features such as real-time dashboards to compare it to your actual effort as you execute the project. You can reset the baseline as many times as you need during the project to always be able to measure your project variance instantly. Get started today for free.

How to Make a Project Budget

As noted, there are many components necessary to build a budget, including direct and indirect costs, fixed and variable costs, labor and materials, travel, equipment and space, licenses and whatever else may impact your project expenses.

To meet the financial needs of your project, a project budget must be created thoroughly, not missing any aspect that requires funding. We’ve outlined seven essential steps toward creating and managing your project budget:

1. Use Historical Data

Your project is likely not the first to try and accomplish a specific objective or goal. Looking back at similar projects and their budgets is a great way to get a headstart on building your budget.

2. Reference Lessons Learned

To further elaborate on historical data, you can learn from their successes and mistakes. It provides a clear path that leads to more accurate estimates. You can even learn about how they responded to changes and kept their budget under control. Here’s a lessons learned template if you need to start tracking those findings in your organization.

3. Leverage Your Experts

Another resource to build a project budget is to tap those who have experience and knowledge—be they mentors, other project managers or experts in the field. Reaching out to those who have created rough order of magnitude estimates and budgets can help you stay on track and avoid unnecessary pitfalls.

4. Confirm Accuracy

Once you have your budget, you’re not done. You want to look at it and ensure your figures are accurate. You can use our project budget proposal template for this process. You can also seek those experts and other project team members to check the budget and make sure it’s right.

5. Baseline and Re-Baseline the Budget

Your project budget is the baseline by which you’ll measure your project’s progress once it has started. It’s a tool to gauge the variance of the project. But, as stated, you’ll want to re-baseline as changes occur in your project. Once the change control board approves any change you need to re-baseline.

6. Update in Real Time

Speaking of changes, the sooner you know about them, the better. If your project planning software isn’t cloud-based and updating as soon as your team changes its status, then you’re wasting valuable and expensive time.

7. Get on Track

The importance of having a project management software that tracks in real time, like ProjectManager, is that it gives you the information you need to get back on track sooner rather than later. Things change and projects go off track all the time. It’s the projects that get back on track faster that are successful.

If you manage your project expenses using these building blocks you’re going to have a sound foundation for your project’s success.

Project Budget Template

If you want help getting your budget together, ProjectManager has a free project budget template that lays out most of the basics for you. For additional support, try our free project budget template.

Project Budget Example

To further illustrate how a project budget is created, let’s pretend we’re making an app. The first thing you’ll need to figure out is the costs of labor and materials. You’ll need programmers, designers, content developers, a dev team, etc. It helps list all the tasks and assign the team to them—a hallmark of good task management. This way every penny is accounted for.

With the tasks broken down for the project and your team in place, you’ll next need to look into whatever materials will be needed. Will they need laptops, other devices and equipment? This must be accounted for.

Now note other line items. There might be travel expenses and renting space to house the team. Then there are fixed items that are true for any project. These are things where the cost is set and won’t change over the course of the project. You’ll also want a column for any miscellaneous costs that don’t fit elsewhere in the budget.

Your budget must have a planned versus actual column. When you’re making that app you’ve likely to pivot and that is going to impact the budget. These columns are a way to track the expenditure to ensure you’re staying on budget.

How to Manage a Project Budget

When managing a project budget, use a continuous process of planning, tracking, controlling and adjusting finances. During the planning stage, define the project scope and understand the deliverables, tasks and requirements. A work breakdown structure (WBS) can help break the project down into smaller, more manageable tasks to estimate costs more accurately. Each project activity should also have cost estimations such as labor, material, travel, equipment, subcontractor or software costs.

While we touched on documents and how they’re essential for tracking, be sure to specifically use timesheets, invoices from suppliers and subcontractors, receipts for materials and expense reports.

Analyzing budget performance may consist of comparing planned vs. actual costs and calculating the variance between them. This helps identify trends and can outline if certain types of expenses are consistently under or over budget.

Controlling a Project Budget

When controlling a project budget, establish change control procedures, or a formal process for managing changes to the scope, schedule and budget. Control can also consist of regular budget reviews, negotiating better supplier rates and contingency management. More complex projects may benefit from earned value management (EVM) to track the project performance against the baseline schedule and budget simultaneously.

Finally, when adjusting the project budget, develop a plan if an overrun is projected. This could mean cost-cutting measures, scope adjustments (pending approval) or getting additional funding.

Project Budget vs. Project Estimate

We’ve spent a lot of time talking about project estimates, but how do they differ from the project budget? A project estimate is what you think the project will cost. It’s the first step when making a project budget, so you want that project estimate to be as accurate as possible. Once you’ve done the research, looked at historical data and all the activities and resources needed to execute them, you’ll submit that estimate to be approved as your budget. But it’s only a guideline, while the project budget is a firm figure.

Project Budget vs. Budget Proposal

Again, when you’re talking about a project budget you’re talking about all the expenditures that are needed to deliver the project. It defines how the money for the project will be allocated. A budget proposal, on the other hand, is the best estimate of the costs required to complete the project. It’s similar to the aforementioned project estimate in that it’s the final project estimate, the one that’ll be presented to stakeholders. They’ll then determine if the figure matches what they think is viable and either approve it or reject it.

More Project Budgeting Templates

Project budgeting is one of the most important aspects of project management, no matter what industry you’re in. However, your project budget might look slightly different depending on the type of project you’re managing. Here are some free project budgeting templates for marketing, event planning and construction.

Marketing Budget Template

This marketing budget template is a great tool to start creating accurate baselines for your marketing campaigns. You can customize it to fit the needs of your team.

Event Budget Template

Like a project, an event requires resources that cost money. This free event budget template helps you list down the costs related to your event such as equipment rental, materials and labor.

Construction Estimate Template

Estimating the costs of a construction project is one of the most important construction planning activities there are, as an accurate cost estimation allows construction firms to make sure their project is not only feasible, but profitable. This free construction estimate template is a great tool to start estimating the costs of your construction project.

Project Budgeting Tips

A project budget is extremely important; without the funds to execute a project, it’s dead in the water. We’ve explained what a project budget is, and how to make one and we’ve provided examples. But when you’re in the thick of it, you need tips. These will help you with project budgeting.

1. Document your process when putting together a budget. Documents are essential for tracking the project and reviewing the outcomes.
2. Create contingencies. Have a plan B in place. There will always be unexpected costs, delays and other issues that’ll impact your budget.
3. Project budgeting is a team effort. Seek advice from your team, as they’re the ones with experience executing projects. Meet with experts who can provide you with guidance. Any person or organization that has insight should be tapped for their expertise.
4. Know your resources and their associated costs. This includes any maintenance required for equipment, and don’t forget your team is also a resource. Know their availability, overtime potential and other overhead costs.
5. When estimating costs don’t forget about task duration. These are also estimates and can greatly impact the budget.
6. The budget is a great tool for tracking performance. It can even be used as a communication tool for teams across departments.

ProjectManager Helps Projects Stay on Budget

ProjectManager is online project management software. That means we deliver data instantly to our real-time dashboard, so you can monitor your project across six metrics. When actual costs vary from your planned budget, you know faster and can respond quicker.

You can also plan your budget on our software, adding expenses and then use our resource management feature to assign resources, workforce and hourly rates, which are automatically added to your project. Add expenses at the task level with our Gantt chart, and report on expenses at the task level, too.

Video: Project Budgeting Tips

It’s clear that building an accurate budget is key to setting up your project to succeed. Why not take a moment to listen to our resident project management expert Jennifer Bridges, PMP, who explains how to build a project budget in this tutorial video.

Thanks for watching!

Pro tip: Be sure to track the budgeted vs. actual costs when you’re in the project to see if you’re adhering to that budget. Because after you make a budget, you have to know how to manage it.

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• ¿Cómo Hacer un Presupuesto De Un Proyecto?

The post How to Make a Project Budget: Project Budgeting Basics (Templates Included) appeared first on ProjectManager.

This guide defines what project documentation is and why it’s important in addition to outlining the top 15 project documents that you should always create to plan and execute your projects.

What Is Project Documentation?

The term project documentation refers to the project management documents that are created throughout the project life cycle. These documents, such as the project plan, project schedule or project budget, define activities, procedures and guidelines that the project team should follow.

Project documentation has several purposes such as project planning, cost management or risk management. In addition, there are certain project documents that must be created at a specific project phase as they set the stage for the next step. For example, the project management plan must be created before the project execution phase can begin.

Project management software can help you organize and share information that is crucial to the success of your project. ProjectManager is project management software with advanced planning, tracking and reporting that has unlimited file storage and makes it easy to share product documentation with your team and stakeholders. All of its multiple project views share one source of information to keep everyone on the same page. Get started for free.

Let’s take a look at which project documents should be created at each project management phase.

Project Documentation by Project Phase

Projects vary in size and complexity and some require more comprehensive project documentation than others. Here’s an overview of some of the project documents that are usually created throughout the project life cycle.

• Project Initiation: Project charter, project summary, business case, project kickoff meeting agenda
• Project Planning: Project management plan, work breakdown structure, project budget, project schedule, change management plan, scope management plan, risk management plan
• Project Execution: Project status report, project execution plan lessons learned template, timesheets, change requests, change orders
• Project Monitoring and Control: Project status report, lessons learned template, timesheets
• Project Closure: Project closure template, punch list

Now that you have an idea of the right project documentation for each phase of your project life cycle, let’s dive into some critical project management documents.

Top 20 Project Documents to Include in Your Project Documentation

Here’s a brief description of the important project documents and a corresponding project management template for each of them. Don’t forget to check our library of free project management templates where you’ll find dozens of templates to build your project documentation.

1. Project Plan

The project plan is the most comprehensive of all project management documents because it compiles the project documents that are created during the project planning phase. For example, your project plan should include your project budget and your project schedule.

2. Project Charter

The project charter is written during the project initiation phase and it sets the stage for the project plan. Project managers use project charters to provide a quick overview of the project to stakeholders, sponsors and clients.

3. Business Case

Just like the project charter, a business case is a document that’s created during the initiation phase to convince project stakeholders of the project’s value by explaining the potential benefits it could have for their organization.

4. Project Schedule

At a basic level, the project schedule defines the timeline for the execution of all project tasks. It can also include more details such as the resources needed for each task, who’s responsible for it, the float or slack your project has and the critical path. ProjectManager’s Gantt chart is the perfect tool for creating a detailed project schedule.

ProjectManager offers four kinds of dependencies, baseline tracking and real-time resource availability when assigning work. You can break down you project into subtasks and track costs for each phase to ensure you stay on track. Get started with ProjectManager for free and build a better project schedule.

5. Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

A work breakdown structure (WBS) is a fundamental example of project documentation. It breaks down the project’s scope into smaller, more manageable components. At the top is the overall project goal that is progressively broken down into smaller pieces. This tool helps organize complex projects and ensures they stay on track.

6. RACI Chart

RACI stands for responsible, accountable, consulted and informed. A RACI chart, also known as a RACI matrix, helps define roles and responsibilities for different tasks and deliverables within a project or process. It aims to eliminate confusion about who is responsible for what and improve communication. This is a valuable tool for projects of all sizes, especially those with multiple stakeholders and complex workflows.

7. Risk Register

This document allows you to register all potential project risks and includes a brief description of their potential impact and likelihood. A risk register is an important project document as it provides important information for your risk management plan that contains all risk management documents, strategies and guidelines.

8. Scope Statement

A scope statement defines the activities that will be executed to complete a project. It’s used by project managers to let stakeholders know what will be done and what won’t be done so that expectations are clear from the beginning. It’s part of the scope management plan, a comprehensive document that explains the procedures and guidelines related to the project scope.

9. Project Budget

The project budget is a critical project management document. To create one, you’ll need to estimate your project costs, which include labor, materials, equipment and anything that’s needed to execute the project.

10. Project Communication Plan

A communication plan sets all the guidelines for communication among team members and project stakeholders. It defines the communication channels to be used, the communication schedule and roles and responsibilities among other details to streamline the communication process throughout the project life cycle.

11. Project Status Report

Project status reports are a must-have project management tool because they allow you to check the health of your project at any point in time and share data with stakeholders to keep them updated. Status reports are brief and include the most relevant information only.

12. Project Closure Template

It’s always necessary to create project documentation at the end of the project closure phase. That’s because project managers need to close contracts, create a “lessons learned” document and get formal approval from stakeholders among other important tasks. All of this must be documented so that nothing falls through the cracks.

13. Project Proposal Template

A project proposal is a project management document that provides a quick overview of the key areas of a project. Its main purpose is to convince potential stakeholders of the value of the project during the initiation phase. It should be a persuasive document that highlights the main benefits, goals and requirements.

14. Issue Log Document

An issue log is an example of project documentation that helps manage problems or obstacles that come up during a project. It’s a list or spreadsheet that’s used to document, monitor and resolve issues that could potentially impact the project’s schedule, budget, scope or quality. An issue log helps establish responsibility for resolving issues and creates a historical record for future reference.

15. Change Request Form

A change request form is a standardized project document that formally proposes, evaluates and approves alterations to a project’s original plan. It helps manage modifications to scope, budget, schedule or other project aspects in a controlled manner. This form helps mitigate the negative impact of uncontrolled changes and keeps the project on track with its overall goals.

16. Project Brief Template

A project brief is a summarized version of your project plan, geared towards an audience such as cross-functional teams or stakeholders who don’t need to dive into all the details of a project management plan but still need to have an understanding of the project goals, budget, roles & responsibilities among other key aspects.

17. Requirements Gathering Template

Project requirements are the goals and specifications that are expected from a project to make sure all stakeholders are satisfied. Our free requirements gathering template will help you document all your project requirements.

18. Project Overview Template

A project overview is a 1-page document that outlines the most critical aspects of a project such as its timeline, milestones, budget, status and the team members’ roles & responsibilities.

19. Team Charter Template

A team charter is a project management document that shows the roles, responsibilities, deliverables and resources of a project team. It helps project managers understand the workload and objectives of each team member for better resource planning.

20. Stakeholder Analysis Template

Stakeholder analysis helps identify individuals with a vested interest in a project. A stakeholder analysis template is the ideal type of project documentation to use before the project’s execution phase. It analyzes the stakeholders who can be impacted by a project, decision or initiative. Use this template to better understand stakeholder needs, expectations and influence to develop effective communication and engagement strategies.

What’s Worth Documenting for a Project

No matter your organization’s structure, the ability to record and document all aspects of a project is vital to being a successful project manager. Multiple reports, charts, graphs, documents, change requests and status updates need to be maintained throughout the project life cycle, and documentation works to stitch the disparate pieces of a project together and bring it to a successful finish.

However, your time is limited, and so is patience in most organizations for tedious paperwork. How can you maintain efficiency and effectively document the project? Consider the following to determine what’s worth documenting:

• Client-Related Everything – Imagine that a client suddenly questions a decision that was made months ago. The client says that they chose one direction but your company decided to go down another path during implementation. Clear documentation on client meetings, including notes with dates, times and attendees helps resolve misunderstandings.
• Legal Dictates – For certain projects, legal teams are required to review documentation during the project. For public projects, there might be oversight and review processes that analyze a project after its completion. Know the documentation requirements your legal team needs before your project begins. Playing catch-up is risky in this kind of environment.
• The Right Amount of Process – While you don’t want to get lost in documenting so much of the plan and process that you’re not actually processing, you do want some definition around the project plan and goals. Let your organizational structure guide how many processes to document. For example, trying to operate process-free on a project that requires legal documentation will only get your project in trouble. When in doubt, the best approach is to document.
• Changes to the Project – Ongoing project reports are essential to document, especially as project goals shift. Ideally, you’ll have a real-time online project management tool so your resources and task changes are scheduled live and issues are captured as they occur. However, larger impacts to the project plan should be added to project documentation in a version-controlled manner.

Project Documentation Best Practices

So what are the best strategies you should use to keep your documentation effective, efficient and timely? To align your documentation according to best practices you should:

• Take the Time – Use your calendar! Many people think that calendars are only for scheduling meetings. It’s not. Use it to schedule 2-3 hour blocks of uninterrupted time to assemble an essential document. Instead of taking calls or conversing with a coworker, take the time to get in the zone of writing. With focused time and attention, you’ll be able to make significant progress. Likewise, schedule 10-15 minute blocks in your calendar each week to review and update documentation.
• Have the Right Level of Detail – Putting documentation together for engineers is different from documents you present to executives. Engineers need details you can provide while executives don’t have time to be bogged down with details. They just want bullet points, the bottom line and the next steps. It’s up to you to determine the right level of documentation for the right audience.
• Use Smart Storage – Your documentation needs to be easy to locate. Documentation is useless if it’s buried under a rock where nobody can find it. This includes making sure that the infrastructure is in place to access the documentation online and that the folder structure and hierarchy are easy and intuitive to understand.
• Share with Others – Most people hate putting documentation together but love it when it’s packaged up for them. You’ll be pleasantly surprised that people actually read the documentation! Use your online project management software to store your documents online with the project, ideally in a collaborative, secure environment.
• Version Control and Up-to-Date – Keeping project documentation current and updated is challenging. It’s easy to get to the point of the initial version, but it’s painful to go back and update documentation and maintain version control. The biggest help is the document repository infrastructure you have in place. Automatic version control allows you to manage this process and the consumers of your documentation always trust that they have the latest version.

How ProjectManager Helps With Project Documentation

ProjectManager is work and project software that connects hybrid teams and fosters collaboration. All project documents can be stored on the tool and everyone who needs access to documents will have it. You can create project plans and so much more, making ProjectManager the only software you need for project success.

Make Project Plans on Interactive Gantt Charts

One of the most important project documents is your project plan. You can make and share this with our Gantt chart, which organizes all your tasks, links dependencies and plots milestones to help you stay on schedule. It even filters for the critical path. Our online Gantt charts deliver real-time data and are easy to share so everyone is always working from the most current data.

Monitor Your Project With Real-Time Dashboards

Your project documentation only sets the stage for the execution of your project. To keep to those plans, you need to have a way to monitor progress and performance in real time. Our live dashboard automatically collects, calculates and delivers real-time metrics for time, workload and more. Unlike other tools, there’s no setup necessary. You see what’s happening as the project unfolds.

Go Deeper Into the Data With One-Click Reporting

When a high-level view isn’t enough, you can generate project reports with a keystroke. Get more information on your costs, progress and more. All reports can be filtered to show only the data you want to see. You can attach reports to stakeholder emails or print them out for presentations.

ProjectManager is a flexible tool that allows you to update your project documentation as needed as projects change. Everyone is updated with email notifications or in-app alerts so there’s never any confusion about what’s expected. Use a tool that manages your project plan, resources, cost and team while storing all the project documentation you have to deliver success.

Related Content

• How to Write a Project Summary (Free Template Included)
• How to Write a Project Description: A Quick Guide
• How to Write an Executive Summary: A Quick Guide
• Ultimate Guide to Gantt Charts
• Ultimate Guide to Project Tracking
• How to Use a Project Decision Log for Optimal Results

Sure, documentation can be the bane of your project, but you need it. There are tools that can help you do it easier, better and faster. The online software suite from ProjectManager is a great collaborative tool to create and store your project documentation for easier access and document sharing with your team. Get started for free.

The post Project Documentation: 20 Essential Project Documents appeared first on ProjectManager.

What’s amazing about people is, that despite the external forces at play on our constitution, we can always be influenced by attitude. If your coworkers or managers can motivate you, suddenly that hidden resource is tapped, and you’re ready to get up and go again with renewed energy and focus.

Leaders can motivate and inspire through communication. Great leaders are charismatic and articulate, and they use these attributes to rally the troops. You’ve probably heard or read some of those famous speeches that have helped people at their lowest reach for the highest aspirations.

The following is a collection of some of the best motivational speeches, chock-full of inspirational words, sure to motivate you when you need it most.

Allyson Felix, The Olympic Spirit — and How You Can Tap Into It, 2024

Allyson Felix is an 11-time Olympic medalist. In fact, she is the most decorated track and field Olympian in history. Beyond her inspiration as an athlete, she is also incredibly motivating outside of her sport. She understands firsthand how to navigate setbacks in all areas of life. Live from the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, Felix discusses how to thrive under pressure and find a purpose that extends beyond winning. In this motivational speech, she provides tangible tips that will resonate with everyone, regardless of where they are in life.

Barack Obama, DNC Speech, 2004

Before Barack Obama became the first African-American President of the United States, when he was little known outside the grassroots activist community in Chicago, he was given a national platform as the keynote speaker at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. He acknowledged what everyone was likely thinking and how surprising it was for him to be addressing the audience at the convention. But he started by stating his roots, which were not dissimilar from other Americans, who constitute, after all, a nation of immigrants. He infused the audience, nation and even the world with a sense of hope for the future. After this speech, he continued to connect with people and motivate them to elect him four years later to the highest office in the land.

Related: How to Manage Better with Transformational Leadership

Jim Carrey, Commencement Address, Maharishi University, 2014

From the sublime to the ridiculous, even comic actors like Jim Carrey can find inspirational words to motivate. At this point in his successful career, Carrey moved from celluloid buffoon to philosophic guru. That change was first on display at this speech for the graduates of Maharishi University in 2014. He told these future managers that they should never settle for less than what they want. He illustrated this by talking about his father, who could have been a comedian but chose the safe route of accounting—a job he eventually lost. That life lesson wasn’t lost on Carrey, who saved the world from one more accountant.

Related: The 25 Most Inspiring Leadership Quotes

Steve Jobs, Commencement Speech, Stanford, 2005

Commencements tend to bring out the motivational speeches, and who would expect any less than the best from Apple CEO Steve Jobs. The man who inspired a company to become one of the most successful in world history, and who motivated people to want his products with a zealousness almost unheard of, was the go-to guy for rich insights. At this speech at Stanford, he tells three stories: the first is about dropping out of Reed College, which he said was the best decision of his life. That led to the creation of a company he loved and built up, only to later get fired from. But that dismissal leads to Apple. Finally, he spoke of being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. These challenges, any of which could have sent another spiraling to the depths of despair, taught him to become more resilient and fight harder for what he wanted.

Related: 10 Strategies to Motivate Your Team

Ed Mylett, Your Imperfections Are Your Greatest Asset, 2023

Ed Mylett is a globally recognized speaker, coach, entrepreneur and best-selling author. He uses platforms like YouTube, TikTok and Instagram to share what he has learned as a businessman, father, husband and philanthropist. In this motivational video, Ed delves into facing your imperfections head-on instead of hiding from them. He notes how humans can leverage these imperfections for the better to help them chase their dreams and achieve their goals. To further drive home his points, Mylett uses his personal anecdotes to inspire others. You only need 15 minutes to gain incredible insight from this motivational video.

Al Pacino, Any Given Sunday

Speeches are fiction of a sort, so it’s not surprising that some of the most inspirational speeches can be found in the arts. The football film, Any Given Sunday, is a perfect example. What’s more cliché than the coach inspiring the team to get back on the field and win after being humiliated? But not every coach is as motivating as Al Pacino. When he delivers what has become the “The Little Things You Do Daily Matter” speech on the importance of working together, the actor and script combine to create something bigger than both.

Related: 10 Consistency Quotes to Help You Keep Going

Bill Gates, Commencement Speech, Harvard, 2007

Surprisingly funny and insightful, Microsoft founder Bill Gates’ Harvard commencement address shows a side of the successful entrepreneur that might not have been visible through the glare of fame and fortune. He is probably Harvard’s most famous dropout, but he acknowledged that the university’s environment of energy and intelligence was inspiring. He noted that education is important but so is knowing the wider world.

J.K. Rowling, Commencement Speech, Harvard, 2008

Harvard has the pull to get Bill Gates, sure, but J.K. Rowling, too? Yes! The Harry Potter author uses inspiring words to offer lessons she learned late and wished others had told her earlier. Rowling was a poor, single mother before her writing shot her into the financial stratosphere, but she doesn’t romanticize poverty.  Beyond the humiliation and depression of being poor, she feared failure, and yet it was a failure that gave her the lessons she needed to succeed. That might be unexpected, but it’s also motivating. Who doesn’t have experience with failure? And we can all succeed.

David Foster Wallace, Commencement Speech, Kenyon College, 2005

Regardless of whether you ever finished his famous tome Infinite Jest, the writer David Foster Wallace was smart, troubled and often densely convoluted. But he could be plainspoken and was at his best in this commencement speech, published as This Is Water. He opens young minds in this speech to the fact that as educated as they might be, they can still hold a closed mind. Such narrow thinking puts us out of perspective and falsely tells us we’re the center of the universe. We’re not, and worse, by thinking this way we lose sight to the interconnectedness of the world. We’re all in it together. How’s that for motivating you to do good?

Brené Brown, the Power of Vulnerability, 2014

Brown is a researcher whose speech on the power of vulnerability is excerpted in this animated video. Vulnerability is not often a topic that inspires and motivates people. We’re all too familiar with being vulnerable. But Brown notes that it’s the fear of failure or of not being good enough that makes us put up walls. These boundaries make it hard to connect with others. But it is by connecting with a larger whole that we can achieve our greatest good and see our own worth reflected in the product of our collaborative process. Empathy is a choice. Make it.

Related: Teamwork Quotes: The 25 Best Quotes About Working Together

Sheryl Sandberg, Harvard Business School Class Day, 2012

In this famous speech that launched the Lean In movement, Facebook exec Sheryl Sandberg deconstructs the idea of the career ladder. She is more interested in opportunities that can make an impact rather than titles. The linear path as a plan might work for some, but it can become too rigid and leave people on the sidelines, missing the real exciting stuff that doesn’t follow a set plan. She also throws away the traditional wisdom that says successful people are not emotional. She’s all about passion and sometimes that emotion is going to come out strongly. You don’t want to become an automaton.

Oprah Winfrey, Commencement Address, Stanford, 2008

Oprah motivates daily. If you’ve ever seen her TV show, then you’ve seen how she can whip up an audience. She does that and more with these inspiring words for the Stanford class of 2008. She knows that the personal touch is the most impactful and shares moving incidents from her life, including her feelings, failures and happiness. The bottom line is that even a success as massive as Oprah’s came with its share of heartaches. You must persevere.

Turn Motivation Into Results with ProjectManager

You’re motivated. Now what? It’s time to take the creative energy and put it to work. Get productive with ProjectManager. ProjectManager. is an online work management tool that can help you and your team accomplish your goals, no matter how lofty.

You’re ready to work and ProjectManager is here to help. Start with your idea and break it down into small tasks that will get you there. Those tasks can be set up in the task list view, which has due dates, room for comments and attachments—everything you need to take control of your work.

If you want to get really productive, then you’ll want to get others to help. ProjectManager has a collaborative platform that makes teams work better together. You can stay in contact with anyone on your team, and get valuable feedback from them. Two heads are better than one!

There’s even a kanban board view, which is a way to visualize your workflow and easily get organized. The board is broken down into columns and cards. The columns are stages and the cards are tasks. As you work on your tasks, you simply move the cards from column to column until it’s done. It’s so easy!

Kanban boards help with transparency, too, so you know where everything is in terms of production. Because you’re working on one card or task at a time, it also helps to keep you focused on what you’re doing. ProjectManager helps you manage workflow to avoid bottlenecks and turn that motivation into results.

Motivated? Now that you’re ready to take over the world, you’ll need the right tools to turn that inspiration into success. ProjectManager is a project management software that is cloud-based, so you get real-time data to make accurate decisions. Get motivated and try it out with this free 30-day trial.

The post 12 Best Motivational Speeches That Will Change Your Life appeared first on ProjectManager.

Having your eye on KPI metrics is one of the best ways to track the progress of your team. But first, let’s define some key terms and then get to the essential KPI metrics for teams.

What Is a KPI?

KPI is an acronym that stands for key performance indicator. It is a measurement that demonstrates how effectively a company is achieving its key business objectives. KPI metrics are often monitored with online dashboards or tracking templates. Organizations use KPI metrics to evaluate their success in reaching targets. When you use KPIs on projects, you’re measuring team and project progress.

The importance of KPIs is that they keep your project objective always on the front burner, so there’s little chance that you’ll leave them unattended. The project objectives must be communicated clearly throughout the project team, so everyone knows the KPIs they’re responsible for.

What Makes a KPI Effective?

For a KPI to be an effective project measurement, it first must be agreed on by everyone in the project and be meaningful to its intended audience, whether stakeholder or end-user.

The KPI metric must be quantifiable and able to be analyzed. It has to be measured regularly to have any team management value.

Naturally, all this is to say that the KPI is aligned with the overall objectives of the project and the organization. They must be realistic and cost-effective, and align with the culture of the organization, resource constraints or overall project constraints.

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KPI Dashboard Template

Use this free KPI Dashboard Template for Excel to manage your projects better.

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Two Types of Team KPIs: Quantitative & Qualitative

There are two different types of KPIs: quantitative and qualitative. A quantitative KPI is measurable by numbers and a qualitative KPI is more descriptive, such as measuring through a survey to get an understanding of your end-user.

14 essential KPI metrics are listed below.

Quantitative Team KPIs

1. Overall task programs: Provides measurable insights into project performance, efficiency and resource utilization. It includes data on task completion, milestone achievement, task duration, schedule variance, etc.
2. Workload efficiency: Refers to how effectively team members use their time and resources to complete project tasks. This KPI can be calculated differently depending on the context and goals.
3. Timesheet submittals: Tracks employee work hours to ensure accurate payroll and helps manage project costs. An example of a time worked calculation is end time – start time = hours worked.
4. Task dependencies: Assigns measurable values to relationships between tasks to result in better analysis and prediction of project schedules. They are quantifiable through lead or lag time, critical path analysis, resource dependencies and more.
5. Project schedule: Involves translating the planned project activities into measurable values to help objectively analyze and track progress. Quantify this project KPI through task durations, dependencies, milestones, critical path analysis and more.
6. Cost variance (CV): Measures the difference between the budgeted and actual costs of the project. The formula is CV = earned value – actual cost.
7. Milestone achievement: Notes the number of milestones completed on time. The formula is (number of milestones achieved / total number of planned milestones) * 100.

Qualitative Team KPIs

1. Mentoring time: Refers to the time allocated for experienced project team members or managers to guide, support and develop less experienced members. This KPI focuses on skill development and career growth.
2. Collaboration: Outlines the process of communication on project deliverables, whether it be in-person collaboration, commenting on tasks in a software, sending emails, etc.
3. Stakeholder/client satisfaction: Gathers subjective feedback from stakeholders on their perception of project progress, communication and overall satisfaction. This KPI can be achieved through group discussions, informal feedback, interviews, etc.
4. Communication: Ensures the project team and all relevant stakeholders are aligned on the project’s goals, objectives and progress. It’s helpful for building trust and understanding throughout the project.
5. Team evaluation: Outlines how well the team is communicating and working together toward the project’s goals. KPI evaluations can take place both informally and formally to better understand how the team is working together.
6. Project risk assessment: Identifies, analyzes and evaluates potential risks that could impact the project’s objectives. It’s a proactive approach to project KPIs that can mitigate potential problems before they arise.
7. Deliverable assessment: Gathers qualitative feedback from stakeholders on the quality and usability of project deliverables. This feedback can help guide deliverables on future projects.

How to Use KPIs

In order to use key performance indicators effectively, you should blend the two types to get a complete metric for team performance. To achieve this, take these steps:

1. Write a Clear Objective: What are you trying to measure and control? Be specific, the more pointed your objective, the better you’ll be able to measure and control.
2. Share with the Team: Make sure those objectives are communicated throughout your project team, so everyone is on the same page. This, as noted, is crucial so that the KPIs are met throughout the project.
3. Update: Regularly update the team, as objectives can change. A KPI is a moving target and to take a picture only once is not going to give you the data you need to get anything of value.
4. Review Weekly: Meet weekly to make sure that as the project progresses, everyone stays informed on what you’re measuring and how. This is how you can track and control your project’s progress and communicate the most important topics to your team.

Best Practices for Team KPI Tracking

There are a lot of things that make a KPI effective, as noted above, but these three tips will keep your KPIs working accurately and effectively:

1. Make sure the KPIs you created are aligned with the organization and project.
2. Make sure they’re achievable and not unrealistic for your team.
3. Make sure that they’re actionable.

If you use an online project management software, you’ll get live data, which means your team is able to update in real time. Not only does this lead to more accuracy, but with a real-time dashboard, you can see the project’s progress at a glance with easy-to-read graphs and charts.

KPI Dashboards

While there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to tracking project management KPIs, one of the easiest and most effective ways to do so is through a KPI dashboard. This powerful tool provides a comprehensive overview of project and health progress using updated data. As a result, project managers and stakeholders can see the project’s current status at a glance. Other roles that might use this KPI dashboard include functional managers, department heads, top management teams or C-level executives.

KPI Dashboard Template

For those interested in using a KPI dashboard but aren’t sure where to start, our free KPI dashboard template for Excel is the ideal place to start. It helps identify trends so businesses can stay alert of challenges or opportunities.

In our KPI dashboard template, users will find a section on the timeline, budget, task priority, task status, workload analysis, resource planning and profits and losses. There is even a revenue and expenses breakdown by month. Feel free to customize the template so it reflects the information you need to track.

How to Measure KPIs with ProjectManager

KPIs are only as good as the instrument you’re using to measure them. ProjectManager is a cloud-based project management software that instantly updates as teams update their statuses. These updates are displayed on our real-time dashboard, with widgets that track your tasks, costs, teams, project health and more.

Some of the KPIs you can monitor include your team’s workload. On the dashboard, you can see each individual team member’s progress. Our color-coded charts and graphs let you know if they’re on, ahead or behind schedule for time, cost, workload and tasks, with their percentage of progress calculated automatically.

When teams update their tasks and timesheets that information populates the dashboard to keep you on track when managing a project. No more having to calculate your KPIs on an overly complicated spreadsheet or by hand.

Your KPIs are only as good as the tools you use to track them, and no project management software offers you features like ProjectManager. But don’t take our word for it, try it yourself with this free 30-day trial.

Learn More About KPIs

KPIs can differ from organization to organization, but the essentials remain constant. Project managers understand how KPIs are a helpful benchmark to increase productivity in teams and improve costs, cycle time and stakeholder satisfaction.

But they’re more than just a performance tool, they can be used to motivate teams as well. Getting your team behind a common goal fosters positive competition. Meeting KPIs can be used as incentives and be rewarded to get even more out of your team. Watch Jennifer Bridges, PMP, to start your KPI adventure.

Here’s a screenshot for your reference.

Thanks for watching!

Transcription:

Today, we’re talking about Eight Essential KPI Metrics for Teams. But first of all, I want to talk about what a KPI is. I want to talk about two different types. I also want to talk about how we create them and a few best practices.

So first of all, what is a KPI? So, KPI is a key performance indicator, and it’s a measurement that demonstrates how effectively a company is at achieving key business objectives.

Organizations also use these to evaluate their success in reaching targets, but we can also use these in projects, and when used in projects, we’re looking to evaluate and measure the team’s progress.

So, let’s look at two different types. We have quantitative KPIs and qualitative KPIs. And when we’re talking about quantitative, we’re measuring those KPIs using numbers. When we talk about qualitative, we’re measuring the KPIs by opinions or traits.

So, the four quantitative ones that we commonly look at are the overall tasks programs. We’re also looking at the workload efficiency of the team, as well as timesheet submittals. How good or how regular and how accurate are they at submitting their timesheet? And also, looking at some of the task dependencies.

And when we look at qualitative, we’re considering how much time is spent with mentoring. We’re looking at collaboration and how much time is spent with collaboration. We’re looking at stakeholder and client satisfaction, as well as communication.

So, we want to use a blend of these two types. So how do we create these KPIs? How do we come up with them?

Well, first of all, we write a clear objective of what we’re trying to measure and control. And then, once we do that, we share that or those with the team. And then we update those on a regular basis and we review them weekly.

So, a few best practices are that you want to make sure that the KPIs that you create for your project or your team is aligned with your project and your organization.

You also want to make sure they’re attainable by your team members so they don’t become demotivators.

And you want to make sure they’re actionable.

Now, with project management software, these can be managed and updated in real time. And when your team members can update them in real time, there is a tendency towards more accuracy.

So, you can also use these in your dashboards and have a visual view so that not only you as the manager or project manager but also your team members can have insights into what’s going on on the project and the team’s progress.

So, if you need a tool to manage and track your KPIs and keep them visible for your team, then sign up for our software now at ProjectManager.

The post 14 Essential Team KPIs for Any Project appeared first on ProjectManager.

When it comes to choosing a management style, there are many things to consider. For instance, what is the culture of the company, the personality of the executives and the business environment? What kind of project management tools do you use; are they collaborative or planning-based? Choosing a management style is a personal decision, one of great import. Your decision will influence every aspect of your business, project and team.

Let’s take a deep dive into top-down vs bottom-up management to get to a fair conclusion. From there you can narrow the field and make the appropriate choice. We’ll discuss examples of top-down vs bottom-up management, look at different organizations and more.

What’s Top-Down Management?

Also called autocratic leadership, top-down management is the most common form of management. It is hierarchical, with a chief executive office (CEO) who sets the course for the entire company. Their leadership is then carried out through a succession of executives, middle management and finally down to the bottom of the totem pole.

In top-down management, everything from the workplace to the business systems is all determined by upper management, and then it’s passed down the chain of command. Each role is responsible for carrying out the mission as stated by the higher-ups, without much room for comment or criticism. While some lower-level managers might join the decision-making process, ultimately the final decision rests with the C-level executives.

Traits of a Top-Down Manager

Top-down managers may also be called directive or autocratic managers, exhibiting traits that define their leadership style. Many of them share common characteristics.

• Confident decision-makers: Make decisions independently with minimal or no input from subordinates. Their authority is concentrated at the top of the hierarchy.
• Provide authoritative instructions: Provide clear, specific and detail-oriented instructions to clearly define and communicate expectations.
• Emphasize compliance and control: Monitor performance and ensure compliance, prioritizing adherence to rules, deadlines and procedures.
• Delegate tasks: Prefer to maintain control over key processes, so they delegate tasks instead of empowering subordinates to make decisions.
• Don’t emphasize collaboration: May prioritize how an individual performs over team collaboration, as input from subordinates may be seen as less valuable.

Top-Down Management Examples

Let’s consider some behavior examples to better illustrate the top-down management style.

Issuing Directions

An example of top-down management behavior may revolve around issuing directions. Instead of asking for team input on an upcoming marketing campaign, the manager sends out an email that details the campaign’s strategy, audience and execution plan. Or, if there’s an issue with a software release, the manager immediately dictates the solution without consulting the development team.

Task Management and Control

Regarding task management and control, a top-down manager may closely monitor every aspect of task execution and provide detailed instructions. Even an employee who has worked at the company for years may not have the autonomy to publish website updates without submitting them for approval. Top-down managers want to approve even minor decisions, preventing team members from taking initiative.

Strict Adherence to Procedures

Finally, this type of manager may focus on strict adherence to established procedures, even when flexibility is helpful. For example, if a current workflow isn’t the most efficient way to manage a new product launch, a top-down manager wouldn’t make changes as they prioritize compliance over problem-solving.

Examples of Top-Down Organizations

As noted, most organizations use top-down team management. Any company with an executive ladder (with a CEO on top, then middle management, then team leaders directing team members) is structured in such a way.

Obvious examples are the Trump Organization, Helmsley Hotels and Martha Stewart Living. Regardless of your opinion of the people leading these companies, they all have strong personalities, which become the faces of their respective companies.

Pros and Cons of Top-Down Management

The pros of top-down management aren’t always immediately clear to low-level employees, but they are there.

Clarity if the Leader Knows their Stuff

One of the advantages of top-down management is that it sets clear goals and expectations, as goals are delivered by one person, and that message is not diluted by committee or multiple voices. Because the law is laid down from on high, the employees don’t have to be distracted by participating in the process of decision-making. This gives them more time to focus on their tasks.

The top-down management style requires a strong leader, and there are benefits to this type of leadership. It makes it easier for middle management; they have direct orders and can act on them quickly without second-guessing or trying to decipher mixed signals.

This isn’t to say a top-down leader should be simply shooting from the hip. These types of management structures work best when the leader has done due diligence, researched and considered all angles of how the decision will impact business and employees.

Lack of Buy-In if the Leader is Weak or Dictatorial

On the downside, the idea of a powerful personality leading the company can veer from thoughtful and careful stewardship to something more dictatorial. If that happens, buy-in from employees suffers and morale sinks, which in turn impacts the ability for the business to stay competitive and be successful.

Furthermore, if the CEO of the company is not a strong personality, then they’ll be less likely to take on the necessary responsibilities, and the business will pay the price. Therefore, this type of management approach is not for every organization, especially those that are looking for more creativity to help them reposition themselves.

What’s Bottom-Up Management?

The idea that “two heads are better than one” is the primary reason that some companies don’t apply a top-down management approach. There could be a lot of talent in the ranks, which would be wasted in a top-down environment. Or, the leadership is not skilled and knowledgeable enough to lead decisively. In these cases, bottom-up management is recommended.

The broad definition of bottom-up management is it’s a structure where the whole organization participates in the process of leading the organization. This collaborative method gives employees a say in how to accomplish the overall goals and objectives of a business. Bottom-up management utilizes their unique perspective from the front lines of the work.

Teams are autonomous and are assembled by skills and experiences, which are then trusted by managers. These teams are self-directed and decide on the best way to accomplish their tasks, rather than receive orders and only then act on them.

Related: 6 Tips for Developing Cross-Functional Teams

Traits of a Bottom-Up Manager

A bottom-up manager, also called a democratic or participative manager, strives to empower their team and prioritizes collaboration. Many of them have the following traits.

• Empower team members: Delegate authority and responsibility to their team members as they trust them to make informed decisions.
• Prioritizes collaboration: Foster a collaborative and supportive team environment, encouraging open communication and knowledge sharing across all members.
• Boosts employee morale: Prioritize each employee’s well-being and satisfaction as they strive to create a positive and inclusive work environment.
• Emphasizes feedback: Encourage and value feedback from all levels of employees, even those below them to improve their processes and performance.
• Decentralized decisions: Encourage team members to participate in the decision-making process as they value diverse perspectives and input.

Bottom-Up Management Examples

Now, let’s explore various examples of bottom-up management to better understand their traits.

New Process Implementation

If a new process is being implemented, a bottom-up manager would organize a team brainstorming session to gather input from all team members. They prioritize this diverse perspective and want to get ideas from everyone involved.

Listens to Concerns

When team members have concerns or suggestions about processes, a bottom-up manager shows empathy and respect. For example, if an employee is unable to finish a task due to having too many other tasks on their plate, the manager would welcome this feedback and work to create a solution.

Flexible Work Schedules

Even something as simple as providing a flexible work schedule is an example of bottom-up management behavior. If an employee has to go to a doctor’s appointment or work shifted hours for one day, they would have the ability to do so with an understanding manager.

Examples of Bottom-Up Organizations

While still in the minority, more companies are embracing the bottom-up style of management. The approach is seen in the way some businesses are approaching projects, if not in their overall administrative process.

For example, The New York Times and even staid businesses like Ernst & Young and IBM have all tried the bottom-up management approach at the team level. Everyone should be a part of the decision-making process, at least in the subsets of the organizations. As these experiments prove fruitful, more companies will come on board and even adopt the style for their full administration.

Pros and Cons of Bottom-Up Management

The advantages of bottom-up management are clear to people who are not employed at the top tier of an organization.

Gets the Most Out of a Team’s Talents and Dedication

One advantage is that bottom-up management can retain talent, keep morale high and get project buy-in since it gives lower-level employees a voice. Because the whole organization feels part of the process, the company is more likely to improve productivity. If everyone feels ownership in the overall goals and objectives of the company, they will likely be more dedicated to its cause.

Furthermore, the ability to get the most out of an employee is one of the great benefits of bottom-up management: it allows for the full talents of employees to be used. Those employees who are lower down the corporate ladder are often the ones who are interfacing with customers and dealing with the nuts and bolts of what a company does. Therefore, their input, which is not considered in a top-down management approach, is a competitive edge in bottom-up management. Sometimes this even leads to business process improvement.

Too Many Voices & Ideas Slow Business Agility

In terms of disadvantages, having employees a part of the decision-making process can slow things down or have the company follow unproven ideas that dead end. This can cost precious time, losing time to market, allowing the competition to take advantage.

A glut of ideas is not always the best way for maintaining high business agility. Given the high number of choices, it can be difficult to discern the best one. This may require more time for research in order to make an educated choice. Or, once a decision is made, that choice might not be followed consistently, causing the company to pivot without rhyme or reason.

There’s also the issue of ego. If everyone is vying to get heard, they might be motivated by self-interest rather than the overall goal of the project and company. This creates division and conflicts that are not good for business.

How ProjectManager Helps Whatever Style You Use

ProjectManager is award-winning software that is used to help organize projects by tens of thousands of teams, including Volvo, the US Postal Service and NASA. What’s unique about our software is its flexibility. It can help manage your marketing plan or project, whether your company’s style is top-down or bottom-up.

Traditional Tools for Top-Down Teams

Our software is designed to work in more traditional environments, where the plan comes from the top and is structured in clear phases from start to finish. Our Gantt chart project view collects all your tasks on a timeline, breaks up the larger project into manageable phases with milestones and links dependent tasks to prevent bottlenecks down the line.

The view gives a lot of control to the manager of the project, who can then assign specific tasks to their team.

Tools for Agile Teams, Too

If your company likes a more agile framework, with self-directed teams working collaboratively in short bursts, then our software can easily cater to your needs. For example, our kanban board is a great way to collect backlog items and then plan sprints, giving teams the reins to manage themselves, while managers still get transparency into the process.

Whatever way your business is organized, you’re going to want data to track progress and make sure your initiatives are moving forward as planned. We have several ways to monitor your project. Our cloud-based software delivers real-time data to a dashboard that automatically charts several project metrics, and one-click reporting prepares you to relay the latest info to your team.

Dashboard charts and reports can be easily shared, so top-down organizations can keep their stakeholders in the loop and bottom-up organizations are able to keep everyone on the same page. We have the features to suit any management style.

The Choice is Yours

The differences between top-down and bottom-up management are significant, each with their pros and cons. The decision, of course, is up to you. Now that you know about these two opposing leadership structures, which will you choose?

Leadership knows that productivity can increase with dynamic software, regardless of the management style. ProjectManager is a cloud-based project management software with online Gantt charts for project planning, kanban boards for team collaboration and real-time reports for better decision making. Whatever type of leader you are, try it today for free with this 30-day trial.

The post Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up Management: What’s the Difference? appeared first on ProjectManager.

Project Management Challenges: Lack of Project Resources

The first thing to do when you notice your resources aren’t covering what you planned for in your project is to identify the context. Resources can be anything from materials to personnel, and the situation that brought you to stretch your resources to the breaking point can have many causes.

• New Technology: You might be working on a software program that is more advanced than your ability to support or your team hasn’t yet developed the skill set to use it properly.
• Higher Priority Projects: There might be another project that ends up combined with yours and some of your resources are pulled from your work to another.
• Unforeseen Events: You can prepare for risks and plan for uncertainty, but people get sick, take unplanned time off, and non-human resources can suddenly have supply issues.
• Poor Planning: Sometimes it’s as simple as a lack of planning, which is why planning thoroughly before executing a project is so important.

When the issue is minor, you can apply a quick fix by looking at your project plan and task lists and seeing if there is any moving around that will open more time. But here we’re talking about more major shortages of resources.

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Assessing Your Resource Shortage

What do you do to overcome a lack of project resources? We suggest a two-step process to help your resource management.

1. Identify the Situation and its Impact

Some of the possible causes for the lack of resources. Once you’ve determined why then the next part is to figure out what the impact on the project is. Without that knowledge, it’s impossible to resolve the issue.

2. Leverage Your Change Control Board

While it might seem like this is a problem you alone should address, it’s not. You want to employ the help of the change control board. First, relay the situation and the impact to your cost, time, scope and quality. Then provide several options you have to resolve it, and listen to their recommendations. After a course of action has been decided upon, help facilitate that decision, and throughout resolving it, adjust as needed.

Even with the help of the change control board, you might not be able to adjust to meet the need for more resources. At that point, they decide to allocate more resources and allow you to re-baseline the project.

Related: Best Resource Management Software

Resource Management Techniques to Combat a Lack of Resources

One way to keep an eye on project resources when they are scarce is through effective resource management. There are several techniques to optimize resource allocation, utilization and tracking.

Capacity Planning to Meet Changing Demands

This is the process of determining the production capacity that an organization needs to meet changing demands for its products or services. It analyzes current and future workloads, assessing available resources and identifying any imbalances. It takes a proactive approach to resource management to ensure an organization can meet its obligations.

Capacity planning is ideal to use when there’s a significant fluctuation in demand or when a company is introducing new products or services. It’s also commonly used during seasonal variations or when planning for long-term strategic goals.

Resource Smoothing for Efficient Resource Usage

Resource smoothing aims to optimize resource utilization within a project without changing the project’s critical path or overall completion date. It strives to create a more consistent and efficient workflow by evenly distributing resource demand over the project’s duration. It does this by adjusting the start and finish dates of non-critical tasks to level out resource demand.

Use this resource management technique when resources are limited or there are significant fluctuations in resource demand. This is also an ideal way to reduce stress on the project team.

Workload Reallocation to Keep Resources Balanced

This is a way to manage project resources by redistributing tasks and responsibilities to team members to optimize resource utilization and balance workloads. Tasks are shifted from overworked individuals to those with the available capacity or relevant skills.

This is the ideal technique to use when team members are experiencing uneven workloads or when facing resource constraints or skill imbalances. The result is increased productivity and a reduced risk of project delays.

Resource Breakdown Structure (RBS) to Identify Resource Relationships

The resource breakdown structure is a resource management technique that provides a hierarchical overview of the resources that will be needed in a project. The resources are organized by category to make it easy to spot inefficiencies. This can help prevent a lack of resources in the first place.

Use this technique in situations where detailed resource planning, allocation and tracking are critical to project success. Large, complex projects often benefit from using an RBS in addition to projects where resources are limited.

Resource Leveling to Address Overallocation

The purpose of resource leveling is to prevent situations where resources are overbooked or unavailable. It’s a project resource technique that helps resolve overallocation or underallocation to create a smoother and more balanced distribution of resource demand over the project’s duration.

This is ideal to use when resources are limited or if there are significant fluctuations in resource demand. It’s also used when cost control is a primary concern.

Monitoring Project Resources When There Are Constraints

To avoid a resource shortage, you must monitor your project resources throughout the project. There are several ways to do this in your project management or resource tracking software. You can:

• Track resource availability
• Manage workload allocation to track hour-by-hour availability
• View project schedules to monitor task progress
• Monitor resource productivity on your project dashboards.

You’ll be better off if your project management software has all these resource monitoring capabilities. That way, you’re not burdened by data transfers between two systems, and you can track availability and performance in real time.

ProjectManager, for instance, has real-time dashboards that show you exactly how your resources are performing at a high level. Plus, you can track other key metrics at the same time. Want to dig deeper? Create one-click workload reports or check our workload chart. No project management software does more for resource management than ProjectManager. Try it free today.

Make a Good Resource Plan

The best way to reduce the risk of not having enough resources to finish the project is by making sure your resource planning is as thorough as possible. To start, you want to thoroughly list the resources you’ll need, estimate how many of each you’ll need and schedule them to meet your deadline. That means all the people, equipment and materials that are necessary to complete the project.

Related: Resource Planning Template

Following that list is a schedule. This is the timeframe in which the resources are needed to get the project done. You’ll want to figure out the duration you’ll need each of your resources to understand their impact on the schedule.

Your need for a particular resource can change dramatically from day to day; therefore, you want to address the quantity issue. For example, how many times a day or week or month do you need that resource? This will help you squeeze every bit of use out of those limited resources.

Finally, you need to identify the assumptions and constraints related to your resources. An assumption if what you believe to be true, and constraints are the schedule, cost and cost of the project. A strong resource management plan won’t change the amount of your resources, but it will extend their use to fulfill the requirements of the project.

How ProjectManager Helps with Resource Management

Having a resource management plan is important, but so is having a project management software that has all the features you’ll need to implement it. Your schedule is only as good as your ability to track it. ProjectManager is cloud-based project management software that gives you the real-time data to accurately track the progress of your project and resource use.

For the resources of your team, you can track their hourly and daily availability. Holidays and vacation days are also noted, whether they’re local or international, which is a great feature for projects with distributed teams. You can use our resource management tool to monitor and manage your team’s workload as well.

This way, if one of your team members is overtasked and others are not working, you can quickly adjust the workload. This is not only fair and prevents burnout, but it is a more efficient and effective way to manage your resources.

Learn More About Overcoming a Lack of Project Resources

You can never know enough about managing your resources. Good project managers don’t allow themselves to fall into complacency. Watch Jennifer Bridges, PMP, who taps her expertise in project management to guide you through a short training video that helps you extend your resources and meet project expectations.

Here’s a shot of the whiteboard for your reference!

Transcription:

Welcome to the PM Challenges Series. Today, we’re specifically talking about overcoming a lack of project resources. But first of all, some people ask, or they wonder how did I even get here? What situation am I in that I am even have a lack of resources?

Well, I think it’s really important to identify the situation you’re in, because there are different reasons of how you got there, and approaches of how you overcome it based on the situation.

So first of all, let’s consider that with new, specifically, emerging technologies, sometimes it’s hard to find resources who know how to program, or support that technology. So sometimes it’s hard to find them, and even if you do, they come at a premium cost.

Another situation could be that in your organization, a higher priority project comes on board, and then all of a sudden, some of your key resources are pulled off the project.

Also, unforeseen events. So sometimes, we think of maybe natural disasters. Sometimes people have projects where maybe they have union labor, so if there’s a strike that may impact the resources.

Also, I know one instance that I had once, there was a guy on my team who was an organ donor for his sister. So they had been waiting years for this to happen, and then all of a sudden in the middle and critical moment of a project, he was called up for the donor process. So he was pulled out for significant amount of time, so we had to fill his position.

And then also, there’s just the flat out poor for lack of planning. So when these situations happen, of course, there’s an impact to the project. So you know, projects are, the components of the project are the cost, the time, the scope, and the quality. So you have to assess how this situation impacts your project. So let’s look at a few ways that you can overcome these situations.

So first of all, if it’s a minor lack of resources, you can look at your project plan, and your task and see is there someone maybe who has some slight time that maybe could fill in for another? Or maybe, you know, there’s something that you can rearrange that’s minor. But these, I believe, are more specific lack of resources that we’re talking about here on this whiteboard session.

So first of all, identify the situation you’re in, and the impact. And then, leverage your change control board. Sometimes, some project managers try to fix this problem on their own, and it’s really the decision of the change control board of how to handle. So how do we do this? You present your case.

So once you find this situation and the impact, you wanna specifically identify the situation and how it impacts your cost, the time, the scope, and the quality of your project. And then identify our position several options for the change control board to consider.

And then make your own recommendation, doesn’t mean that they have to take it, but it does let them know that you’ve done your homework, and your research of the situation so that you can give them an idea of which path that you recommend.

And then facilitate the decision with the change control board. And when they get guidance, they may have you, for instance if it’s an emerging technology, they may have you go procure or find additional resources for the team that may add more cost so they can approve it.

If not , they may decide, “Well, you know, we’re having a hard time finding those resources,” so they will be the ones to maybe approve an extension or delay in your timeline. Or maybe they may decide, well, they may take out some of the scope of the project.

So they are the ones who can ultimately make those decisions and give you the approvals so that you can re-baseline your project. And then, so you go back, and once the decision has been made, you adjust accordingly.

So for sure, if you need a tool that can help you overcome your lack of resources, then sign up for our software now at ProjectManager.

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