by Kamy Anderson
Being a project manager comes with plenty of responsibilities, so being as productive as you would like can often be very challenging. To make things even tougher, rarely anyone talks about increasing productivity when you’re an eLearning project manager.
Fortunately, you’ve come to the right place. We’ll be looking at some of the most critical steps you need to take as an eLearning project manager to make sure you complete your daily tasks more efficiently and effectively.
The following tips will help you supercharge your productivity and take your project management skills to a whole new level.
#1: Always Set SMART Goals
To make sure every project runs smoothly and you achieve all your goals, you need to set SMART goals. SMART is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely goals. Do your goals meet these criteria?
Before starting any project, ask yourself these questions:
- What is the specific goal of this project? Why is it meaningful, and what benefits will it provide?
- Can I measure everything my team and I achieve to evaluate our level of success?
- Is it possible to achieve my goals, or are they unrealistic? Do my team members have the right skills for achieving them?
- Are my goals relevant to the company? Are they relevant for the team members involved in the project?
- What is the deadline for achieving the goals? Is the project urgent? Do we have the time to complete it successfully?
Only by setting SMART goals can you make sure you efficiently and effectively complete every project. You and your team will stay focused on what’s important, which will help you become much more productive.
And remember, you must have a deadline because the sense of urgency will motivate your team and help them achieve your goals.
#2: Follow the 80/20 Rule
The 80/20 rule, or the Pareto Principle, states that 80% of your achievements usually come from 20% of your work. This means that you can achieve most of your project results by focusing on your most important tasks.
How can you better focus on your most crucial tasks? By better managing your time.
There are many different software solutions for better time management, so make sure you explore them and find the perfect fit. Once you do, you’ll be able to see exactly how you spend your time, including how much time you spend on each task.
For instance, you may be spending a lot of time checking and answering emails. You may waste a lot of time checking social media. You may spend too much time on particular project management tasks that don’t carry a lot of weight.
An excellent time management tool will help you stop wasting your most precious resource, and start using it more productively.
#3: Run More Efficient and Effective Project Status Meetings
As an eLearning project manager, you certainly spend a lot of time in meetings. But are you perhaps spending too much time on project status meetings?
Meetings can also be great productivity killers, so you need to make sure you focus on efficiency and effectiveness when running your meetings.
You can learn from experts, such as the Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who follows the so-called two pizza rule to run productive meetings. If two pizzas are not enough to feed everyone in a meeting, there are too many people in that meeting.
This means the more people there are in a meeting, the higher the chances of distractions, disengagement, and wasted time. Therefore, when planning a project meeting, only invite the key stakeholders. That way, every meeting will be productive, and you won’t waste your precious time.
#4: Make Sure Email Doesn’t Interrupt Your Work
Email is undoubtedly one of the most critical communication channels that you use daily. You use it to interact both with clients and your team, but it’s also there for your personal use.
Having said that, email is one of the biggest productivity killers. People spend roughly four hours a day reading and answering emails at work, that’s four hours that could be used for more crucial tasks.
You can’t ignore essential emails, but you can manage emails better to make sure it doesn’t interrupt your work.
You can set up alerts only for the most important people relevant to your project. You can organize your messages by using the 80/20 rule so that you receive only high-priority emails while you work. You can also use labels for organizing incoming emails, and make sure personal emails and newsletters go to other inboxes that you will pause during working hours.
You can also consider alternative communication channels for interacting with your team so that you eliminate any and all email distractions.
#5: Utilize Collaboration Tools
Effective collaboration is key to successful projects. You certainly communicate with your team members via email, and perhaps use various discussion boards to collaborate in real-time.
Nevertheless, you should also utilize other tools specifically designed for enhancing team collaboration. There are plenty of those to choose from, such as Basecamp, Asana, Trello, and more. You should also consider utilizing a training tool that comes with excellent collaboration features. That way, you’ll make sure your team members consistently upgrade the skills necessary for achieving your project goals while effectively collaborating with one another.
All of this is especially important if you have remote workers. Collaboration tools and a dedicated training tool will ensure seamless communication and collaboration within your team, which will significantly improve the chances of project success.
To Conclude:
With these simple tips, you will become a more productive eLearning project manager. You will build a powerful and productive team that knows how to handle all their tasks and can help you complete every project with flying colors.
