5 Steps to Managing Your Startup's Projects

Project management is a critical part of running a successful business. It helps you keep track of all the details that need to happen in order to complete your goals. Setting up a project management system & software does not need to be overwhelming. I'll help you get started today!!

Choose a project management software.

There are lots of software out there to do this & there are a few different approaches - all depending on what works best for you & your team. My favorite tool for this is Monday.com. Monday is a paid software at about $60 for every three seats. I think it's totally worth the expense and really pays for itself with the amount of time that will be saved searching Google folders & emails endlessly trying to find information.

I also like JIRA for app & software development projects. It's very standard in that space and you can operate on a free version pretty well. This is very much made for development projects, so I don't think it works as well for other industries. But, it can work.

Asana would be my #3 choice, with Teamwork & Trello falling to the bottom.

Of course, we can't forget Microsoft Project - the OG of project management software. I'd say this is for a very specific type of project - namely complex engineering, manufacturing, or construction projects. It's a very complex software & I don't like the online version. But, if you need very detailed reporting & project tracking, MS Project really does that the best. Again, not for everyone by any means and I'd say certainly not if you are working with a remote or geographically diverse team.

Set up your project board.

Okay, those are the tools. Now, for the actual board. There are a couple of different views you can utilize for organizing your projects and managing tasks.

A project board is a visual representation of your project timeline. You should use a project board to organize your tasks by date and assign each task to a particular member of your team.

The simplest board, in my opinion, is the kanban board. It's kind of like a glorified digital sticky note tool. Essentially, you set up your columns in the workflow that your tasks will travel down.

Here is a simple workflow:

• Not started

• In progress

• In review

• Final updates

• Approved

• Complete

You would create all your tasks for the project in "Not started" and then assign them out to your team with deadlines & priorities. As they progress on each task, they just drag & drop the ticket to the next phase.

This is a great system to use for fairly simple projects. You will outgrow this at a certain point. But, with Monday and most PM software, you can toggle between views. In Trello, I believe you are generally locked into a kanban view, which is why it's. not one of my favorites.

Another view you can use is the timeline view, also known as a Gantt chart. This is great to have a visual of the start & finish of your project. It will help you understand how much time you have for each task & if your project is at risk of going past the deadline.

Here, you can also set dependencies - such as the walls of the house can't be painted until the drywall is finished. And you can set the duration of each task, so it really starts to build out the story of your project and how long it's actually going to take. Sometimes, this is more eye-opening than we want, but that's okay. We'll get to this later.

The final board I'll touch on is what Monday calls the "Main Table." In Asana, this is called the "List" view. Essentially, you'll create buckets of tasks in a list format & then add tasks to each bucket.

Here are some simple buckets for a product launch:

• Pre-launch

• Launch

• Post-launch

Basically, you are separating out the tasks by a category to make it easier to view your project & understand timelines for everything. Again, in Monday, you can toggle between Kanban, Gantt & Main Table very easily.

Create milestones.

Milestones are checkpoints along the way to completion. They help you stay focused on what needs to be done next and provide a sense of progress.

The idea here is to be very selective in your milestones. What are the big, major gating tasks that will really determine the timeline & success of your project? What will stop everything in its tracks if it isn't done? For example, in a software development project, the testing phase of a new release could be a milestone. If testing fails, you cannot move forward until the problems are resolved.

Depending on your software, there are different ways to set milestones. Here is how to do it in Monday.com:

• Add "Timeline" column to your board

• Click on Timeline

• Check box on bottom left "Mark as a Milestone"

Your project should not have a lot of milestones. And your milestones should be very clear - no subjectivity here!

Manage tasks.

Here is where the rubber meets the road. Now, these things need to happen! If you have a project manager, even. a fractional part-time one, they will work with your team on the day-to-day management of tasks.

Now, if you truly want to be successful in utilizing project management in your startup, here is the tip I'd give you. Your team needs to live & breathe in the project management software. Otherwise, two things will happen. It won't be up to date - they'll wait until the end of the week to update their tasks or forget altogether. Or, you won't reap all the rewards that a great project management system has to offer.

Here is what I mean. You put the system in place so you can have a handle on your projects - really at any given time. If your team really uses the software, it will look like this:

• They have the software open almost at all times.

• They communicate with the team within the software as much as possible.

• They attach documents & assets directly to the software.

• Detailed explanations of each task are added, so when it gets passed to another teammate, it is very clear what is needed next.

• There is a history of events that have happened for each task within the notes or comments.

• The tasks are always up to date because the team revises the status, timeline & notes as they work on it.

That can sound like a lot. It will take a little time to get here. But, once the team starts to understand that the days of searching through emails to try & find out why their task wasn't approved is gone. The days of clicking into endless Google folders to try & find that one graphic they need is in the past. The days of digging through Slack to see what that one comment they need to finish their task is finally over! Once they realize these things, getting everyone operating in the software all the time will become the new norm.

Closing the project.

Okay, this is the often forgotten step by teams - especially in the startup space. There are a few reasons to formally close a project.

First, you need to sit with the team and talk about how things went. What worked? What did not work? What can you improve on the next project? These are very valuable lessons to extract from a project & painful mistakes will be repeated without this!

Next, there is a psychological shift that happens when something is marked "done." Have you ever added something to your To Do's list that you already did just for the joy of checking it off? This is what I mean. It closes the loop, so to say. Open loops are energy & creativity drainers! They kill motivation and productivity. So, close those freaking loops already by formally announcing the project is done!

Finally, celebrate the wins! Your team worked hard on this project. They deserve a pat on the back...and a beer in the hand if you can do that too. 🍻 It's so important to celebrate your team & all they accomplished. And, again, the psychology behind it is powerful! They will move into the next project with a new pep in their step knowing they learned lessons along the way, there were obstacles they overcame, and there may have been a detour or two along the way - but, they did it! They were successful & grew along the way. And they created something in the world that didn't exist before!! Way to go team!!

So, that's how you manage projects for your startup!! Now - off you go to get started using project management systems & software to help your team be ever-more successful!!

If you need help getting started, reach out to me & we can chat: kristie@kristielemauga.com