All posts by executivesalad

Handle Scope Change Requests with Appropriate Discipline

When a project begins, you must gain agreement with your sponsor on project scope. The scope is defined at a high-level in the Project Charter or Project Scope Statement. At a low-level, the scope is detailed through the approval of the business requirements. Once these two documents are approved, you have enough information to understand scope through the remainder of the project. Continue reading Handle Scope Change Requests with Appropriate Discipline

Easy Ways to Prioritize Project Tasks

Put these into practice and you’ll never wonder what to work on first again!

Tip #1: Be realistic

You’ll never get everything done, so you may as well accept that now. Those tasks that are at the bottom of your To Do list aren’t urgent or important enough to work on right now. It will be easier for you to focus on the important tasks once you realize that your time is limited and that you have to get realistic about what you can achieve in a day. Continue reading Easy Ways to Prioritize Project Tasks

Six Tips for Managing the Project Budget

Many projects will benefit from a Financial Management Plan. This plan provides guidance on how you will estimate, budget and manage costs.

If you want to successfully manage your budget you have to be sure to capture all of the expenditures paid to date, including all expenses related to labor, equipment, supplies, material, etc. Then compare the numbers against your budgeted spending for this same time period. You may or may not have an apples-to-apples comparison. There are a couple reasons why a project may look like it is having budget problems when it may really not be. Continue reading Six Tips for Managing the Project Budget

Should You Factor Positive Risk into Project Planning?

Risks represent potential future events or circumstances that could have an impact on your project. Generally we think of risk having a negative impact. However, what if the impact on your project was positive? In that case you would have an opportunity risk. Continue reading Should You Factor Positive Risk into Project Planning?

5 Communication Tools That Are Better Than Email

You don’t have to be ruled by your inbox!

Tool #1: Collaboration software

If you are still assigning tasks to team members via email then you will find collaboration software a completely liberating way of working! It lets you allocate tasks to someone and see what has been assigned to the rest of the team, including yourself. It will manage your To Do list and add notes to tasks so that you can stay up-to-date with the latest status of project work. Even better, it lets you start and contribute to online group discussions which takes a lot of the chit chat and decision-making process out of your inbox. Continue reading 5 Communication Tools That Are Better Than Email