Avoid Missed Project Deadlines with Better Project Management

Even if you approach the situation as prepared as possible and with the best of intentions, missed project deadlines may still occur for a wide variety of different reasons. When they do occur, however, it is important to treat them as a temporary stumbling block and not a major disaster that stands to derail the entire project. While missed deadlines are hugely important, they should be learning experiences. They should empower you and provide both you and your team with the information you need to not only recover and hit your deadlines moving forward. Better project management practices will help you schedule future projects that you haven’t even started yet.

Missing Project Deadlines

Your Team

One of the major reasons why you and your team may miss project deadlines has to do with the skills that you need versus the skills that you have. Not every person on your team will be qualified to perform every task that needs to be done. If you find that you’re missing project deadlines due to an incompatible skill set, find out if the employees in question need help. If they require a different set of tools to complete their work, provide it for them. If you need to bring in different people, don’t be afraid to do so for the good of the project.

Unreasonable Project Deadlines

Another common reason for missing project deadlines has to do with the fact that they were never attainable goals in the first place. Unrealistic or unreasonable project deadlines essentially set your team up for failure from the start. Once you recover from these stumbling blocks, it’s important to learn how to use project management software properly in the future to help schedule, budget and allocate responsibilities so you don’t wind up in a similar situation down the road.

Spreading Yourselves too Thin

Spreading your team too thin is another common reason why projects can miss deadlines. If you’re faced with a team that is working too hard and still isn’t missing deadlines, it’s important to be prepared to bring in additional people to help carry the brunt of the work. Additionally, project management software can still be hugely invaluable when it comes to allocating resources and making sure people don’t have too much on their plates at any given time.

Missed deadlines are serious, but they aren’t the proverbial end of the world. So long as you know what steps you have to take to get a project back on track, you and your team can be well on your way to success both now and in the future.

Key Takeaways:

• One of the most common reasons for missed deadlines has to do with an incompatible skill set.
• Don’t be afraid to bring in additional employees that have the correct skills, or to help carry a bit of the workload from an overworked team.
• Project management software can help you set realistic deadlines and goals so that you don’t run into these types of issues moving forward.

Project visibility is also an aspect of project management that is important to meet tough project deadlines. A clear understanding of the company and project objectives enables members of the project team to take ownership of a project and to be more effective. Project portfolio management provides visibility that facilitates the executive decision making process by providing accurate information and a realistic perspective of the projects being executed within an organization. To learn more about how project visibility can help your team meet project deadlines, take a look at the case study below.