It’s abundantly clear to anyone in business – communication is a vital component to day to day business, and even more so during projects. The timeliness of data sharing, responses, updates and the follow up not only has a direct effect on the project timeline, but also on the effectiveness of the work employed to reach the project goal.
For these reasons, amongst others, it is crucial for any project to have a central point person responsible for all the gathering
and distribution of information. This central source, or project manager, is the go-to person for all team members on all points of reference, and must be included, or at the very least, Cc:d on the results of meetings, conversations, emails or strategies throughout the project life cycle.
During a project like a website redesign, there are many players involved, from developers and designers to IT departments for server work, webmasters and marketing departments for strategy, goal setting and content. With so many people in the mix, for a project that can span months, the project manager works as the workflow manager as well as the watcher of key deadlines and KPI’s during the process.
There are several skills and focus areas that ensure your project manager is the right person to keep your website redesign, or any other project, on track to success:
- In-depth understanding of the players on the team, their purposes and skills sets, as well as strengths and weaknesses. This data should be farmed in R & D stages through development of a communication plan.
- Attention to detail. Your project manager needs to be able to focus on multiple communications, details and shifting criteria throughout the web redesign process. It’s not only the devil that’s in the details, but the lifeline of your project.
- Ability to reprioritize. Based on project steps, changes and potential pitfalls, your project manager needs to be able to reprioritize the critical, mid-level and low tier project elements to streamline the process and avoid extended delays.
Ultimately, your project manager needs to have a finger on the pulse of the project and all the moving parts and people in it. They’re ability to maintain control of the communications will keep your website redevelopment, or any other project, on deadline and strategy.