I love technology, but many times my project teams do not! So how do we try out these new web 2.0 concepts like Mind Mapping, Twitter, Blogging, Wiki's or even using Facebook to help manage our projects? Baby steps.
Over the years I have found out that you need the right team of people on a project to try out these new concepts to see if they are effect at communicating your project details.
The 2.0 phenomenon for project management may be common project management practice in the next 10 to 20 years and now is the time to try out some of the basic tools that are out there now.
Currently, my favorite Web 2.0 tool is SharePoint. It offers many out of the box tools that are customizable and allows other off the shelf application to plug into it to play nicely. I like SharePoint because it is easy to share documents with and has a great project communication tracker built in so you can keep track of your project emails within your project SharePoint site (or use it to Tweet your project updates, and set up user profiles for your staff to add details and photos of themselves; or send a photo from your blackberry from your construction project to an email address that is tied into your project and your team).
Times are a changing and the new social networking on the web will give us a taste of where this technology may be adapted for project management.
Podcast on Project Management 2.0
Podcast on social media and project management
Blog on Project Management 2.0
Project Shrink
Web 2.0 and other new communication tools are making it easier to manage projects, provided that they are used as tools and not weapons.
ReplyDeleteI have posted some of my favorites at http://bit.ly/GS0UI
Ryan,
ReplyDeleteThanks for linking to Andrew's Project Management 2.0 blog. It would be great to see your feedback on Andrew's thoughtsin the comments to his posts.
We used Sharepoint at my previous employer and I found it was a constant struggle to get the team to use it. In fact, I often ended up being the only person posting documents to the team room which, when you think about it, is not particularly useful. The struggle was certainly not technical (my team was an engineering team, and certainly not technology-averse) but more behaviourial: it seemed that the habit of keeping up-dated documents on a project team room was far from engrained. (This habit is similar to keeping your Facebook or LinkedIn profile up-to-date which is not a habit that our generation has picked up.) So I think the question here is not "what Web 2.0 tools can project managers use" (they are certainly out there) but more "how to get our team members to open up and use them". And THAT is the real challenge, isn't it?
ReplyDelete@Elisabeth, you are correct that the challenge is to try to get people to use these new tools. The good thing is that more and more of the younger generations are using social networking so hopefully in the next 10 years it will be common place in our projects.
ReplyDeleteOnce the rules & workflows of document management within the project have been established, the files&folders could be named within the team work package descriptions. Unless the deliverables has not been finished AND documented and filed in the appropriate location, the PM should not sign off the work package to the team for billing. Especially dealing with several departments, the billing/signing off issue is one of the tools for keeping control as an assigned PM. Line managers would like to see their people productive and paid at the end of each month, so one could use this "pressure" to ensure the team follows the - prior - given agreements regarding tools and documentation. Team prep talks and positive feedback for following team project agreements can work wonders too :-)
ReplyDelete