How the Project Manager Manages the Team?

Project management is the process of managing a team to achieve a target within a specified budget and with a specific amount of resources. These resources may include several employees, time constraints, and other infrastructure management like networking, databases, and cloud resources. It requires skill and experience in a certain domain and managers become better as their experience increases.

Who is the Project Manager?

A project manager oversees the lifecycle of the entire project from its initiation to closure.

1. A Project manager must make sure that deliverables are completed within the required time.
2. He is fully responsible for managing the team members, sharing resources effectively between teams, and communicating all the details of the project to the relevant stakeholders.
3. A good project manager ensures employees can achieve their targets without stress or burnout by playing to their strengths.

How does the Project Manager Manage the Team?

Managing teams effectively is crucial to the success of a software product. Below is a list of all the things that you should keep an eye on while managing teams.

1. Convey the Purpose Clearly and Effectively

• What problem does the team solve? People are much willing to give their best when they know exactly why they have been assigned a project. Purpose includes telling your team the problem that they are there to solve and the change that comes with the successful execution of the project.
• For example, If we were working on a project like the Geeks for Geeks platform, this step would entail telling the team that it is it’s to empower programmers and technology enthusiasts worldwide to excel in their coding skills and unleash their full potential. The problems here being solved would include, things like equal access to knowledge and opportunities through technology.

2. Inform the Team of the Plan to Build the Project

• This requires the experience of the project manager. Things like the SDLC model that should be used to approach the project like scrum or Kanban in agile or a rapid application development model would be decided in this step.
• This is an important task as it takes into account factors like the availability of the different team members, clients, and stakeholders. This phase also includes setting up the tools being used to track project progress and the relevant metrics. The subproblems, milestones, and requirements are all laid down in this phase of management.

3. Assigning Roles

• After we know what we have to do and how we have to get there, now comes the time to decide who will do what, then assigning roles is the next work. By assigning the roles to the different team members, one informs them about their duties.
• One helpful step can be to break the bigger problem into smaller problems and then develop individual solutions to those smaller problems. So, assigning roles can be viewed as the step wherein it is decided who will work to solve what part of the smaller problem.

4. Encourage Collaboration

• This step might seem unnecessary at first, but without proper communication and collaboration, team members will not be able to build trust amongst themselves and hence, it will stunt the project’s growth.
• A good environment fosters good development. No one wants to work in a place where people make mistakes and hide them or blame each other. Encouraging collaboration boosts open communication and allows the free flow of ideas in the project. This paves the way for innovation in the project.

5. Get your Solution Ideas

• It involves encouraging the team members to suggest ideas to solve the different aspects of the problem at hand. It requires an open mind and the technical expertise of the project members involved. The ideas of every team member should be valued equally and all ideas should be documented. This step, if executed nicely can work wonders. It can lead to new innovations and amazing solutions to complex problems. Different teams work together to plan the solutions to different problems and now, it is time to combine all the best solutions to solve the bigger challenge.
• For example: In a software project this would be the phase wherein we decide what frontend framework would work best depending upon other factors like the DevOps environment and the backend.

6. Put the Best Ideas to Build the Solution

• In this phase, the actual development starts. The best ideas combined in the previous step are put to execution in this phase. This is the most challenging and time taking phase in any project and requires effective team management.
• Different aspects of the project are built and any blockers and delays or constraints must be reported to the manager. The appropriate technological tools to be used are approved by the manager and any changes in the project requirements must also be accommodated.

7. Handling Mistakes and Delays Effectively

• In any project mistakes, conflicts and delays eventually arise. An effective team manager must be prepared to lead the team through the ups and downs.
• Mistakes, risks or Delays must be handled such as to mitigate or minimize their impact on the project completely. It requires honesty from team members and patience on the part of the manager.

8. Convey the Project Progress to Stakeholders

• Throughout the project, the manager communicates the progress to stakeholders to inform them of the project progress, the milestones, blockades, challenges overcome, and the risks.
• This ensures the satisfaction of the stakeholders who might be controlling the financing of the project.