The absolute best, top of the line project management software packages come equipped with multiple tools. They are designed to be more comprehensive than the average product, but the catch is, these cost a lot more too. In case you are looking for a more streamlined solution that lets you pay for only the features you need, we will discuss some of the more widely useful functions that dedicated project management tools serve to perfection.
Planning a Project
Perhaps the most preliminary and surely the most important feature expected by most businesses would be a software’s ability to let users plan the project ahead. Some of those expected functionalities from the software that lets you do exactly that are as follows:
- Laying out the critical path from start to competition
- Interdependent task visualization
- Setting small, intermediate and final goals, as well as the deadlines for each
- Assigning responsibility to each member of the team
- Allocation of resources, as deemed necessary of the project at hand
Planners are also the most popular project management tools among industry leaders due to their innate complete nature. Check out the list of project management software on The Digital Project Manager which includes only what the top names across various industries are using right now, and not what they were using three years ago. Time is always an important factor to consider here, because software, irrespective of how good it may have been just a few years ago, could fast become outdated in comparison to newer products, if it’s not being updated by the developer on a constant basis.
Task Management
Task management sounds almost synonymous to project management, which would at times even be accurate if the project in question was small and simple enough. Some of the core features of a task management tool are as follows:
- Allocation of goals, budgets and deadlines to each specific member of the team
- Skills and performance metrics to gauge the asset value of each team member
- Real time notifications on the completion of each task/end of deadlines
Problem Management
A common problem with projects that have complex technical aspects to them is that they run into problems frequently, which the management team either fails to give priority to, or they are simply ignorant of the possible repercussions of a scope creep.
The so-called problems can come in many forms including, but not limited to, errors, malfunctions, glitches, adding of unplanned parameters to the project, etc. A project management software that is specifically designed to handle such problems will have two primary tasks; identification of the problem, and identification of the root cause/causes responsible for causing the problem.
The nature of the project and its size determines which project management software tools should be on your list, but more importantly, the general, overall nature of the projects that your business handles will also need to be taken into account. You may not need one tool for a certain project, but it might be useful for another that you have going on side by side. In such cases, the more comprehensive and extended the software is, the better.
