Collaboration, enough for project success?

Collaborative project management is a term that has derived from the ability to manage and share communications and information relating to a project delivery on-line. As a term, it has become a fashionable concept as the business world has moved to the internet to run itself and as teams become more dispersed.

But is collaboration sufficient to effectively ensure a successful and profitable project for your business?

The premise here is that the project manager is capable of course, the tools are simply that – tools, not project management.

Well certainly, communication is a key part of a successful project, but in a standard business, I would argue that face to face interaction will never totally be replaced by on-line collaboration (video interaction included). It is simply too important to talk to your customers and get a “feel” from them about how things are going.

So what can we use it for?

1. Tracking written communications and requests.
2. Assigning activities and tasks to people so they know what they have to do and when.
3. Reminding people of when they have to do their actions.
4. Submitting and tracking project “problems” so that the right people know about them.
5. Allowing people to comment on activities and messages.
6. Documentation review.
7. Team updates and conversations.

These are the basics that will allow you to successfully collaborate on line.

However, is this enough to ensure your project remains profitable and on-time?

Absolutely not. You simply can’t expect a communications tool to effectively look after the other key aspects of a successful project.

What about;

1. How much time you have spent on a project?
2. How much budget have you spent to date?
3. Are you still on time?
4. Are you delivering a quality project?
5. How will we know if we have a problem?
6. How are you informing your management team know what’s going on without having to be included on every message?

These are some of the basics. Without these, collaboration will lose it’s impact on it’s ability to help you deliver your project.

Remember;

1. Project managers have a responsibility to ensure they come in on time and on budget and to quality.
2. Senior managers need to be able to see how every project is doing against budget and time along with being able to assess which projects may need their support.

Without this information, your project collaboration tool simply becomes another communications method. Effective in its own way, but not sufficient to run a project with the required control.

What are your thoughts?

Photo : PSD