Tracking Projects in Office 365 and SharePoint: One Size Does Not Fit All

Project management is an essential function of every organization, with all levels requiring the ability to track and manage projects to some extent. Unfortunately, most organizations spend money and effort with the best of intentions on a project management tool that cannot be applied across the entire organization. This benefits only a few employees, such as the professional Project Manager, but leaves a majority of other departments and roles, including Marketing and IT, to use insufficient methods like Excel for project management needs. 

The reality is that the level of project management functions varies across organizations. One size does not fit all. After more than 1,000 customer deployments, SP Marketplace has seen a variety of project management models in a variety of different size organizations.  

In large enterprises or for certain project-heavy industries like construction firms or IT companies, there is a need to manage large-scale projects, often managed by project professionals. This requires rigorous processes, resource scheduling, and extensive reporting. 

While these projects are critical for the organization, there also exists many smaller projects in departments that are managed by casual project users, often department heads. Applying the same rigor and processes as large projects can result in a situation where managing the project takes more time than the project itself. It is for this reason that many managers still use Excel for projects. In this blog, we will look at options for how to manage and track small to medium projects.

Read More