Tips on effective project management

I was wondering why 65% of the projects go into trouble and more than 85% of them are never recovered back on track.As a fact of matter, reports have concluded that “it is, basics which were missing in the projects” and we always look out for rocket science solutions.Well, it is always “easier said than done”.Commonsense and street smartness are definitely prerequisites for any work including project management.

Following table highlights basic tips for effective and successful project management

Sr#	Area	Tip
1	Success criteria	How will you know when you are done?
2	Project definition	Clearly define the project, objectives, boundaries, deliverables
3	Stakeholder identification and objectives	External as well internal stakeholders and their prime objectives
4	Roles and responsibility Chart	Take acceptance from all owners and make them speak out their responsibilities
5	Template repository	Keep all Project templates in one repository. Have uniformity
6	Budget tracking	Regular, periodic, provisioning
7>	Project scope and out of scope	Clearly define what’s not. Have a single document for scope
8	Risk management plan	Take it separately, have weekly meetings and monitor if new risks have been identified and old risk are mitigated. Keep track of risk log once a fortnight not to get into risks but to check if Risk management is happening
9	Team involvement in identifying steps required for each project deliverable	Take agreement on time commitment and evaluate against estimates
10	Change management plan	Every change in deliverables, scope, technology, schedule etc should be managed
11	Competency level check	Training plan, mentoring, backups in case
12	Go no-go decision plan	Evaluation Criteria, periodic, documented. (DAR)
13>	Disaster recovery plan	Task force. Identify individuals/groups for crisis situation. Draw demarcation and segregate different situations. Do not involve all teams/members at all the times for all the crisis
14	Requirements management plan	Business to technical to testing requirement mapping and traceability. Update all changes and impacted areas. Maintain requirement change document throughout the project
15	Shorten meeting times	Ideal time is 10 to 20 minutes
16>	Assess status report effectiveness	Check if you get queries, feedback on reports. Is it read? Does it meet all stakeholders expectations (perspective). If not, is it good to make different reports for different stakeholders
17	Test orientation	Should NOT be 1. defect free delivery 2. good testing means highest number of defects
18	Closure	Create an open, safe place for people to give honest and sincere feedback on the project
19	Anonymous survey to your project team	Questions like: What went well on the project? What could have gone better? What would improve your experience on future projects? How could the project leader be more effective?
20>	Sign off, project closure and acceptance	Make sure formal document (one pager) is prepared and sent across to all stakeholders specifying project has been completed and delivered detailing out important scope and its readiness. Take acceptance from all