Project Planning in Teamwork

Project Planning in Teams

March 22, 2007

Project planning in Teams

To plan a project a team should have a goal and should work as one unit to achieve certain objectives. In project planning, team members should implement inventive ideas that would serve their goal in a resourceful way. Each individual on a team should take part in the planning process, because the diversity of team members and their different perspectives can create more than one approach to initiate a project. Project planning can be explained as determining the goals and objectives of a project through a coordination of procedures and determination of courses of action before initiating a project. Project planning is a rational determination of how to initiate, sustain, and finalize a project. There are many steps to be taken when planning a project within a team.

When working on a project, the first thing to be done is set up a goal to be reached. Ask what to be accomplished from this project or the reason for it. The answer would be one’s aim or goal. In this step, a team must decide where they want to go with that aim, what decision must be made about it, and when the decision must be made to reach that goal. This step is the main process in the project planning because it should provide the ultimate decision to be made.

Project Planning in Teams

To have a successful plan when working with a team, set a role of conduct for the team members. Define what each individual’s responsibility is and what to be expected from them. Each project should be broken down into specific tasks; it is important to find ways to divide the work into manageable parts. Each task must be within the team members’ capabilities. Each member should agree on the task assigned to him. Thus one complex project will be organized as a set of simple tasks which together achieve the desired result. In planning any project, a team must follow the same simple steps: if an item is too complex to manage, it should become a list of simpler items.

All projects encounter problems and conflicts. In order to have an early resolution to those problems, team members should discuss each potential problem that they might face. Team members should have a logical approach to problem solving. All problems must be predefined. If team members tend to skip over defined problems, they will be committing a big mistake. It is the way that team members define the problems that determines how will they solve those problems, so it is very important that a proper definition of the problem to be developed. Problem solving should involve finding ways to deal with obstacles and roadblocks that need to be conquered and eliminated. Some of the problems encountered in project planning are: project complexity, project risks, or special requirements and scope changes.

Project Planning in Teams

Have a deadline for the project. If time to get done with the project is not controlled then the project itself can not be controlled. Team members have to prioritize and work on a certain pace. They might also have a set schedule on when each task within the project should be done. Team members should never underestimate the time involved