Project Management Tools

In this report I will review many project management tools available for use to make the task of managing a project run smoothly. Depending on the size of the project, software tools may not always be necessary. The bigger and more involved the project is, the more useful these types of tools will become.

While doing research to look for tools available for use I came across a website that writes articles and provides links to many different types of tools available on the market. The website is called Project @ Work. A couple of the articles I found very interesting where every quarter they write reviews on new project management tools new to the market, and compare them to older tools. In addition they provide discussion forums where you can discuss project management questions and ideas. Their website is: http://www.projectsatwork.com/

Intellect v. 5.0 Executive Project Management

Intellect is a web-based project management system that can work in conjunction with excel. When using this software you are able to fine-tune it to fit your needs. In addition to project management system the company also offers project and process management software, an internal management system, and contractor management system. This software tracks the progress of a project, delegates tasks to those that need it, and flags the appropriate staffing if problems arise. This software also enables you to create flow charts, hold meetings, advanced communication applications, and a wide variety of detailed reports. After touring it's interface I found that it is easy to use web-based system.

Project Management Templates

These are templates that are used in conjunction with Microsoft Excel and Word. Their templates take you though the four life cycles of project management, including initiation, planning, execution, and closure. Looking at the first phase, initiation, their templates include, job descriptions, terms of references, and feasible studies. In phase 2 planning, their templates include resource, financial, quality, risk, acceptance, and communications templates. To includes such things as request for information forms, request for proposals and supplier contracts. Templates to provide for phase 3 include, time, cost, risk, and expense management. There are also many reports you can print such as phase and project status reports. The last phase, closure, includes project closure report and post implementation review. Some of the benefits that the company highlights for using their templates;

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Reduced time completing documentation
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Decreased cost through savings in effort
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Fewer changes, less risks and issues
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Improved quality of deliverables
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More efficient monitoring and control
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Better management of suppliers
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Higher performing staff
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Greater project success.
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(Above list from Project Management Templates Website)

The company does not offer any free previews or views of their software to demonstrate what these templates look like. I would presume that many of them you could make yourself using Microsoft Excel and Word. At a cost of $297.00 the company online brochures didn't sell me on the idea of using their templates over purchasing software designed to do these types of tasks.

Dot Project.net

"dotProject is a volunteer supported Project Management application. There is no "company" behind this project, it is managed, maintained, developed and supported by a volunteer group and by the users themselves." (DotProject.net, 2003) What makes this such a great software tool to use, is first it is free and second the fact that volunteers and users work together to improve and continue to grow this application. Furthermore, with some computer programming background, they provide the source code to this software and you can customize it to any project you may be working on or add features that the software may not have.

References:

Intellect v. 5.0, 2005 Executive Project Management, features and benefits and other software information retrieved on February 22, 2006 from http://www.interneer.com/

Project Management Templates, 2003, Method 1 2 3 Empowering Mangers to Succeed, features and benefits and other software information retrieved on February 22, 2006 from http://www.method123.com/

Projects @ Work, 2006, Website, provided links to resources viewed on February 22, 2006 from http://www.projectsatwork.com/

DotProject.net, 2003, Post Nuke free software distributed under GNU/GPL License, details features and benefit information retrieved on February 22, 2006 from http://www.dotproject.net/