Every project demands a plan that highlights how things will progress from start to end. Project management is a series of events that allows a team to achieve all the project goals within proper time. While creating a project management plan, the primary key factors are scope, resources and time of the project.
The next challenge is to optimize the allotment of these factors to get desired objectives. The following are the core components of project management:
- Describe the importance of a project and estimate its requirements and timescale.
- Create a business case to explain the investment and make sure the proper implementation of plan.
- Check progress against plan, manage project budget and handle risks, issues and changes in plan.
- Motivate the team and maintain effective communication with stakeholders.
- Provide management and end the project in controlled conditions when needed
- Project Life-cycle template
A Project Management Plan (PMP) template is a pre-designed document that project managers can use as a starting point to create their project management plans. It serves as a guide and framework for organizing and documenting various aspects of a project, including its objectives, scope, schedule, budget, resources, communication, risks, and other important considerations.
The purpose of using a PMP template is to ensure consistency and standardization in project management practices. It helps project managers to save time and effort by providing a structured format that can be customized to meet the specific requirements of their projects. Templates also help in promoting best practices and ensuring that essential project management elements are not overlooked.
Typically, a PMP template includes the following sections:
- Project Overview: Provides a brief summary of the project, including its objectives, stakeholders, and high-level scope.
- Project Scope: Defines the boundaries and deliverables of the project, including both what is included and what is excluded.
- Schedule and Milestones: Outlines the project timeline, key milestones, and dependencies between tasks.
- Budget and Resources: Describes the project’s financial resources, estimated costs, and allocation of resources, such as personnel, equipment, and materials.
- Risk Management: Identifies potential risks and uncertainties associated with the project, along with mitigation strategies and contingency plans.
- Communication Plan: Outlines the communication channels, stakeholders, and frequency of project updates and reports.
- Quality Management: Describes the processes and activities to ensure the project’s deliverables meet the required quality standards.
- Change Management: Defines how changes to the project scope, schedule, or resources will be managed and documented.
- Stakeholder Management: Identifies the project’s stakeholders, their roles, and strategies for engaging and managing their expectations.
- Project Closure: Outlines the activities and processes involved in formally closing the project, including final documentation and handover.
Project Management Plan Templates can be found online or within project management software tools. Project managers can adapt these templates to suit their specific project needs, making modifications and additions as necessary.
It’s important to note that while templates provide a good starting point, project managers should always tailor the plan to the unique requirements of their projects and organizations. Each project is different, and the PMP should be customized accordingly to ensure its effectiveness in managing the project successfully.
Best Templates or Tools For Project Managers
It is the duty of a project manager to design an entire project considering minor details to ensure accuracy. However, without the help of particular software’s and tools it is not possible to guarantee high quality projects. Luckily, there is an enormous range of tools and applications that fulfill the requirements of project managers. Mentioned below is the list of five most useful tools in project management.
- Microsoft Project
This software is utilized by project managers to plan the entire project. It works by connecting three blocks: tasks, resources and calendar. This software can make your project successful. It allows complete tracking of all the changes and progresses in the project and has an intuitive interface. When periodic communication is necessary among certain departments, Microsoft projects are a good option.
- Trello
The main feature of trello is that it involves continuous scrutinization of all development phases. The interface includes different boards that indicate processes or projects in an organization. The menu can be shown as a calendar while every board contains task lists, cards having descriptions, color tags, files, comments and deadlines. This tool is suitable for both individual assignments and command directives. Trello is free and has no limitations for its users.
This project management tool is cloud-based that makes project planning easier and aids in tracking the team work, observe deadlines and cooperate with stakeholders.
This app has a number of advanced features such as Gantt Charts, task management and a real-time newsfeed. It offers various integrations options and you can also arrange your tasks depending upon their cruciality which makes it a strong tool for project management. It has an intuitive interface and works great for various teams within a firm like software development, marketing and professional services.
This is also a cloud-based tool that enables project managers to create a huge knowledge base for projects. Evernote possesses various tools that manage the tasks efficiently when used in collaboration. It allows you to design a to-do list and make files or notes in which you can save all kinds of data. Evernote gives assigned access for distinct users.
Smart Draw is a tool that allows you to generate various charts, graphs and presentations. It has a wide range of templates for displaying data for various goals like genograms, decision trees, project charts and more. By using this tool, flow charts, mind maps, PowerPoint presentations and other images can be constructed easily. It is also cloud-based which makes sharing quite easy. It is very easy to operate.
Project Documentation Template
A thorough documentation plays a vital role in determining the success of a project. The basic functions of project documentation are collaborating and communicating the goal and scope of a project to clients or stakeholders. In order to make the idea of the project clear and comprehensive, documentations should be done very keenly.
The documentation template gives a primary format for displaying such information. As these templates are created by experts, the risk of originating problems will be minimized. These templates are available in various layouts such as PDF, MS Excel and MS Word.
Project document includes many forms from project initiation to project plans and project reporting.
PROJECT INITIATION TEMPLATES
This document will tell you about the importance of a certain project, what will be needed for the progress of the project on what time and how it will be executed. It is a sort of agreement between the team and the client. In project management, it’s the first step so it must include the core features of the project that seem worth investing to the stakeholders.
Related Template: Project Initiation Template
PROJECT PLAN TEMPLATE
Following the accomplishment of advanced-level planning, the project manager constructs an extensively detailed plan. It functions as a roadmap for the progression of a project, describing the vital project milestones and putting them on a timeline template. This document is updated along with the project including all the replacements and changes.
PROJECT REPORTING TEMPLATE
Thorough and continuous reporting is very necessary for efficient project management. It may become difficult to make sure that everyone related to a specific project is aware of all updates so project status reports are made to keep everyone on the same page.
This template aids you to sum up the project status, track risks and milestones etc. Project reporting template provides you a visual timeline that will allow you easy tracking of major events of projects.
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PROJECT MANAGEMENT TEMPLATE AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE
Templates minimize rework as they are reusable outlines of projects and act as initiating points for the new work. Project management templates already have details in place and are pre-formatted. These templates allow you to create projects, reports, tasks and other documents without starting from scratch. Use of templates can be advantageous for planning any task.
Related Article: Agile Project Plan Template
Whereas project management software’s aids project managers to organize and manage resources, time and budget of a project and planning the entire framework of a project according to their desired requirements. These software’s are utilized to communicate with stakeholders and clients.
