It is very important to be able to manage your project with maximum efficiency.  What is maximum efficiency?  Well, you should use the best tool to attain the objectives with the highest quality and the lower cost.  And with technological changes, what was good 10 years ago may no longer be good.  I would even say that, given an ever-increasing the pace of innovation and changes in the business and social environment, what was good 2 years ago may not still be good.

So what tools should you be using?  Well in some way you can use the following metrics.  The tools will be defined by the level of efficiency expected by your clients, and the level of efficiency of the tools used by your competition.

  • If your client expect you to deliver using inefficient and outdated tools, then the pressure for efficiency will be low.
  • If your competition is not using the most efficient tool, then again the pressure for efficiency will be low.

610912Change in technology is transformational.  It is like comparing crossing the Atlantic on a Tall Ship comparing to using a modern jet aircraft.

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Your project management tool should be integrated, support project management in one place, planning and reporting and team collaboration.  Otherwise, lack of visibility will kill your efficiency, and adding a heavy governance process to offset the inefficiency of the tool may have been the answer in the past (when such tools didn’t exist) but it is a risky proposal today.

Here’s a great article from ATTask blog to read on project management visibility.

What’s Causing Your Project Management Blind Spots?

25 September 2012 – POSTED by marcusvarner

 Any project manager who’s been around the block has heard the questions: “Does this project accomplish company objectives?”, “Who’s in charge of this task?”, “When will it be done?”, “Who on your team is pulling their weight?”, or “What could we do better next time?”

If you felt a knot twisting in your stomach as you read, chances are you’ve experienced the dread and confusion that come with project blind spots. Either as a project manager or as a member of a department, you’ve run into frustrating times when you can’t answer these questions. You probably know that these blind spots can cost your company in terms of morale, revenue, and competitive advantage.

Well, good news: you can eliminate those blind spots, but you have to know where to look. The following five sources of project blind spots are a good place to start:

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