When it comes to managing issues, most managers will tell you that the problems they face are often the same, day in and day out. These problems are referred to as the "universal issues" of management.
We evaluated some of the most common problems problems reported by managers, and found that many fall within these seven categories.
Here are the "seven pain points of project management."
- Organization: This is an issue that can plague managers. From trivial tasks like office filing, to crucial tasks like complex project executions, running things in a systematic way is an important part of the planning stage of any project. Ensuring that the right tasks have been allocated to the right people and keeping track of how they execute them are necessary considerations when working on a project. Utilizing an online task management platform can help managers stay organized and focused on the important tasks at hand.
- Accountability: Most employees don’t like the word ‘accountable’. It pins those who have been delegated to complete a task with the responsibility of executing it to the best of their ability. Accountability may seem like a simple concept when a single task is delegated to a single person, but when there is an entire team responsible for executing a multi-faceted, inter-connected task, it is much more difficult to lay the blame squarely on one person’s shoulders when things go wrong. It is important that project managers put measures in place to prevent tasks falling through the cracks and make their teams aware of what they must accomplish.
- Consolidation: Consolidation is a key factor of project management. While modern technology has made communication much faster and easier within teams, it hasn’t necessarily done much to prevent the confusion that can ensue from having "too many cooks in the kitchen." It is easy to get lost in the multitude of emails that the average office-going employee receives throughout the day. Making sure that everyone involved in a project or task is on the same page and has access to the same information is necessary for good execution.
- Follow-up: A manager’s time is better spent trying to make choices and decisions that are likely to bring their team closer to achieving their goals, rather than keeping track of what each team member is set to work on and how they are going about it. The follow-up process must result in a manager receiving all the information he or she needs while making their time a priority. An easy way to gather information in one place is to use a task management tool. This allows managers to stay connected with all members of a team, and follow up when necessary.
- Evaluation: The evaluation process is a time-consuming aspect of a manager’s job because it requires a manager to exercise a variety of skills. The data required to provide a fair evaluation must be backed with evidence instead of being subjective. It must then be analyzed and provided to those in question in a timely manner so that performance can be adjusted.
- Visibility: Often, there is no real way to keep track of team members’ performance on given tasks. This means that a lack of transparency can occur leading to issues further down the line. Managers must make it a point to improve the visibility of tasks undertaken by their team members.
- Feedback: Providing good feedback is an important skill for any manager. Feedback must be provided at a time when it is useful, that is, an employee should be able to use the information to make adjustments to their performance so that there is improvement. It also requires a manager to be specific about what is expected of the team members with tact and finesse, and without any chance for misunderstanding. Some task management platforms allow users the ability to provide feedback via performance evaluation tools within the platform, which helps managers offer fact-based feedback.
Fred Mouawad is a global citizen, portfolio entrepreneur, and fourth generation Co-Guardian of Mouawad, the family jewelry business. Mouawad created his newest venture, Taskworld, out of need for a task management platform that not only keeps his teams organized, but also is the first to provide accurate, metric-based performance evaluations on assignments.
