how to manage multiple projects
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8/2/2019 How to Manage Multiple Projects
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How to Manage Multiple Projects
Managers, supervisors, program coordinators, project managers, construction supervisors and
team leaders from all over the world must possess the skill to manage multiple projects.Managing multiple projects, while shifting your attention from 1 project to the next, and
performing the tasks well are developed skills. Whether you manage 3 or 13 projects, your
ability to multi-task is critical in meeting project goals, objectives and deadlines and tocontributing to the success of every project.
1. 1
Hold a meeting with the client and other appropriate people to define the scope of
work for each new project.
o List the project goals and any additional expectations.
o Discuss each step included in the scope of work.
o While you're in the meeting, bring up questions or concerns you may have about
the project.
2. 2
Determine when you can begin work on each project. Schedule a kick off meeting the
day the work will begin to answer any additional questions that the client may have. Be
sure to determine an appropriate due date, as well. It's important to do your best to meet
both dates.
3. 3
Draw up a quote and contract outlining the scope of work for each project.
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o Submit the quote and contract to the client for approval. If there is anything the
client does not understand or if there are items he does not agree with, he willbring it to your attention for discussion before approving the work.
o Make necessary changes to these documents and resubmit for client approval.
o Be sure the client signs and dates the contract approving the project before any
work begins.4. 4
Prioritize your projects. Know which projects are more important. You'll want to make
projects with earlier deadlines a priority.
o Be aware of deadlines as you're working. It's important to stay on track with each
project, meeting each milestone.
5. 5
Track the progress of multiple projects with a spreadsheet or another type of
software geared toward project management. Include important dates, milestones,supplies, contractors, team members and any other resources you need for the projects.
6. 6
Schedule resources appropriately between multiple projects. Equipment should not
sit for days before you use it, and team members should not have to wait for others tocomplete something before they can begin their work.
o Rotate team members, contractors and other resources, like equipment, to ensureyou meet all the needs of every project.
7.
7
Delegate work to your team members. It's always a morale booster to show confidence
in your team.
o Develop group and technical leaders to improve efficiency, lighten your load and
free up some of your time for more important tasks.8. 8
Check project progress daily. If you have projects with longer deadlines, you may be
able to do this once a week. The main thing is to ensure you stay on top of the work.
o Make certain all projects move along as planned. This is especially important
when managing multiple projects. Getting behind schedule on even one projectcan cause delays on several.
9. 9
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Follow up with all your clients periodically and provide progress reports. You can do
this in person, with written reports or with phone conversations. Choose the method thatworks best for your client.
o Review the project. Let the client know what items you have completed, if there
are problems and what the next steps are.o Be prepared for any questions or concerns the client may have.
10. Read about development of our project scheduling software
11. Managing Multiple Projects with
Success Nov 2212. This is a guest post from Brad Egeland - IT/PM & Business Strategy Consultant &
professional PM & Technology author. Read more about him at www.bradegeland.com
13. Managing one project at a time to success is challenging enough. More than 50% of all
projects fail and a recent study discussed on the PMI.org forums indicated that as many
as 76% of all projects fail to some degree. While that figure seemed high, it’s not all thatsurprising.
14. Now consider that many project managers are running several projects at once – not just
focusing on one single project. The prospect of keeping multiple projects in focus and ontrack as well as successfully managing several project teams and customers
simultaneously can definitely add to the potential for multiple project failures.
15. If we, as project managers, are going to be successful in managing projects – especiallyconcurrent projects – several supporting features must be in place. The list is long, I’msure, and most project managers have their own idea of what supporting structure their
organization and their project management office (PMO), if one exists, should provide.
Here are four things that are definitely at or near the top of my list:
16. Executive management support 17. Executive buy-in is critical to the overall success of an organization’s project
management infrastructure. Any PMO without high-level leadership support is doomedto fail. If your executive leadership doesn’t support your project organization, thenfunding may not be there when you need it, critical project resources may not be
available to you or may get pulled to other tasks, and highly visible mission criticalprojects may completely circumvent your PM processes as executives in the organization
hand those projects to other departments or ‘favorites’ that are not part of your PM
structure.
18. Strong leadership 19. PM organizations need a strong leader who is well versed in project management but is
not actively managing projects. A PMO director who spends too much time with hands-on project management won’t be there to knock down barriers for the project managers,
cater to their training needs, and help with onboarding critical resources to highly visibleprojects. A PMO director focused on the needs of the PMs and the organization as a
whole will be a much greater contributor to project successes than one who is too focused
on the daily project leadership grind of managing a handful of their own projects.
20. A sound methodology
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21. No project management structure can succeed long-term without a sound project
management methodology in place. There must be project plan shells and templates,reusable processes, practical policies, and a shared knowledge of project information
available to the project managers who make up the PMO of project infrastructure in order
to achieve ongoing and repeatable success. Without these things in place the PM
organization will be relying far too much on luck rather than proven successful practicesto deliver ongoing project excellence to the customers they are serving.
22. A solid resource planning tool 23. I can’t say enough about how important a resource planning and scheduling tool is to the
success of your projects. Having a tool that enables this as well as providing you with a
firm grip on the resource forecast for the entire project and across all projects is
essential. Several web-based tools can do a fairly good job of this for you. One specificPM tool, Ganttic, that I recently became familiar with seems to do an especially good job
at handling this function. Ganttic does a very good job of organizing your project teams
for maximum efficiency while allowing seamless collaboration within each project.