The basic fundamental role of Projects Managers would develop a project plan, assign tasks accordingly, and manage the project as a whole. In an ideal world, the team would accept their assigned tasks with open arms eager to complete them and report back to you immediately after they are finished. When we step back into reality, Project Managers know assigning tasks can seem like a chore and checking up on those tasks can feel like babysitting. It’s exhausting to track down each team member and ask “Did you get this done?” Using MindManager in accordance with Catalyst can not only make the process of building projects easier but take the unpleasantness out of assigning and monitoring tasks. This dynamic duo gives everyone access to the latest version of the project and can have everyone work on the same map at the same time to update the project instantly.
The first step is developing the project. Using MindManager, it is recommended to start with the Brainstorming Tool to put all the ideas out on the table. Quickly drag and drop each topic into functional buckets or phase plans. Next would be to use the task info section (located on the right task pane) to add durations to each task. This information alone completes the basic foundation for a successful project. However, there are more advanced features in MindManager that will help bridge the gap between managing tasks and managing a project.
Tasks should involve dependencies to show the progression from one task to another. This can be assigned very easily in the Task Info section. Once all the tasks dates have been identified, next would be to add people (resources) responsible for each task. Please pay close attention the resource allocation as they tend to get over booked without noticing. To check this, visit View è Gantt (Drop-Down) è “Show Overutilized & Underutilized Resources in Gantt”. This will mark any over booked resources in red. Now that you have a stable project in place, save this project map to Catalyst under your team’s workspace.
The second step is to instill an effective process with your team. The best practice is to have the entire team work from the project map that is living in Catalyst. From there, team members can filter by their name as well as due dates to get at-risk tasks. Once the team member narrows down the project to the team member’s specific tasks he/she can start completing their tasks. As tasks are being completed, it is imperative to update on the map within Catalyst. When the process has taken effect, if a task is overdue, you know all the information to check up with the teammate responsible for this task to determine the status (see picture below). After the issues of that task have been mitigated, the teammate cause check off the task as being complete and map updates instantly! Not only can each team member update the completion of their tasks, but they can also add questions, issues, documents, and results direct to the map. Consequently, the changes are updated automatically and everyone can see exactly when each task has either completed a task or add new information.
Using MindManager with Catalyst for projects helps reduce a lot of time consuming activities while also inspiring team collaboration. Tag teaming MindManager and Catalyst help reduce long time-consuming activities plus stimulate a positive, collaborate, participative team
- Reduce Status Meetings – Instant updates reduces the need for status meetings because task completion is in the map.
- Trim down mass emails – The collaboration of Catalyst will condense email chains to those who need to send information to the entire team.
- Reduce Searching for documents – All information can be stored on the project map to create a central repository.
- Avoid Information Silos – One person holding all the information in which you have to track down that one person to get the information you need.
- Promote Issue Documentation – All problems & issues can be documented as a subtopic of the task for project visibility
- Overall Project Supervision – Able to monitor overall project success as well dig deep into the details all from one map.