Tools for Project Management and Collaboration

for New Product Development

The internet used to be the information highway but now we have another use for it; collaborative working and communicating. The web has become a collaboration space.

WIKI page for this here

Chris Jennings - PageToScreen

Project Management

• Defining Goals
  • Project specification
    
• Assigning Tasks
  • Team work
    
• Schedule
  • How long will something take
    
• Milestones
  • When something will happen
    
• Dependencies
  • one thing can't be done until another is complete
    
• Budget
• Time is money / tracking time to figure the costs
  

The Project Manager

Getting stuff done successfully and efficiently in a team, depends on good project management, and this usually means one person, having control over the schedule, the milestones and the budgets.

One person can control these tasks by using a piece of software like MS Project. This is a desktop application and is under control of one person. Of course the output of this software can be shared, but this would need to be emailed around so that individuals are aware of the dependencies.

• Unconnected world = topdown management
• Online = Collaborative approach 

Software tools

• MS Word
  • Track changes
    
• Excel
  • date ordering
    
• MS Project
  • Gannt Charts
• Adobe PDF
  • Commenting feature
    

Online Collaboration

There will come a time when the computers we use will simply be gateways to shared spaces like the web where we store our data and subscribe to services like word processing and even, image editing. We could use:

• Forum
  • especially with file upload
    
• WIKI
  • here is my wiki for this topic
    
• Blogs
• Groups and email lists
  
  • see Google Groups
  • see Yahoo Groups
    

Shared Spaces

We are becoming used to the idea of software being provided remotely for our computers.

Is the web becoming Google? Google seems to be on track to provide everything that we might want including 'Documents and Spreadsheets'. You can now create and collaborate on the editing of text documents and spreadsheets.

• Social Bookmarking

Web sites like delicio.us and magnolia are web sites where you can save your bookmarks and share these with others. Indeed, you can create groups and invite others to join.

 

Project Management Online

The way forward is collaborative tools for project management and there are several out there:

• Zoho
• Basecamp

Both of these online tools (Web Applications) are free for one project but charged for after that. The free service is limited and has branding.

Timetracking

Time is money, so tracking time is part of budgeting and invoicing. Here are some online tools:

• Tick
• MyHours
• Harvest
• Basecamp also includes timetracking at the higher paid levels and some service include Basecamp integration

Timetracking can also be done on desktop rather than online with tools like:

• iBiz
• Responsive
  • see a review of some here
    

Getting Invoices Out

There are online invoicing tools which can link back to the timetracking and project management

• Freshbooks
• Blinksale

Convenience and Consistency

It should be possible to link these online tools together so that it would be possible to determine the exact cost of developing a New Product through the tracking of the project.

The e4books project is now gathering momentum towards "e-Day" the target date of 1 May 2008 by which date the whole UK book trade should be trading electronically - lowering its costs and improving its supply chain for printed books.

Virtual Workspace

• Many projects will involve team members who are outside the company and particularly outside the company offices.
  • Consultants
  • Freelance
    
• Trends in business today show that many are working from home.
  • Savings can be made in office real estate
    
• The technologies that we have looked at enable this virtual work space culture.
  

Thank You

This presentation is here:

• www.pagetoscreen.net/presentations/slides/project_tools/

My WIKI article is here:

• www.pagetoscreen.net/wiki/Project_Collaboration/