An Executive Guide to Solve the Project Collaboration Confusion

Collaboration is the most overused word in the business world. Most of the managers often think messaging, chat, and document sharing activities as collaboration.

Sometimes terms like coordination, collaboration, and cooperation are used to explain “effective teamwork”. These terms if not used in the right context fail to convey the exact meaning of “project collaboration”. The lack of knowledge in project collaboration creates a barrier in building a powerful workplace.  

A 2016 survey has found that 70% of American employees are reducing economic growth by not working with full potential. In this group, more than half were found absent and one-fifth are disengaged.   

Read The Full Article

Enterprise Project Management – The Key to Project Success

As a company grows larger and becomes more diverse in its operations, it may begin to experience a variety of growing pains. Entrepreneurs often discover that separate departments or business units are working on similar projects which results in waste of resources and costs.

Within a large organization, two groups might find that they are working on projects that contradict or compete with each other. Even after these situations are figured out, it can take weeks or months to reorder and strategize the overall direction the company wants to proceed with.

Then what's the solution? EnterpriseProject Management or EPM.

What is EPM?

To understand what EPM is and why it’s important, it’s better to take a step back and consider the definition of project management.

Wikipedia says, “Project management is the practice of initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing the work of a team to achieve specific goals and meet specific success criteria at the specified time.”

However, a company involved in multiple projects, each focused on a unique goal with a specific deadline, needs a way to organize and direct those projects. That’s where Enterprise Project Management comes into play.

EPM refers to the way of managing projects on a companywide scale. It involves implementing various strategies and processes focused on streamlining and improving the effectiveness of the company’s portfolio.


Read The Full Article on Orangescrum Blog

What’s New in Orangescrum SaaS Project Management Tool- June 2019

Its summer! And we continued with our efforts to make our customers’ work more fun so that they make more time for vacation and family time. 

The May Mega month saw release of 3 masterful features with an overwhelming response so far. 

Enabling collaboration, ensuring project data confidentiality, personalization and smooth navigation within Orangescrum was the focus of the month for our SaaS edition.

Let’s us review what’s out there and how you can experience it firsthand!

Cloud Edition Updates:

1. Custom Themes & Personalization

Orangescrum didn’t have the theming concept since its release and I’m happy to announce that we do now. The best part is that we’ve heard your feedback since we released the latest new UI.

How to change the theme color of your Orangescrum account? 

To change your theme color;

1. Login to orangesrum.com

2. Click on the setting icon below your profile image

Check the step by step guideline to change the theme color of your Orangescrum account.

2. A Real-Time, 2-Way Sync between Google Calendar and Orangescrum Cloud Edition:

Google Calendar lets you organize your schedule and share events with team members and friends. With Google’s free online calendar, it’s easy to keep track of your daily schedule.

Its ease of use and Google Calendar integration was the most requested feature that came out of feedback from our users, and we decided to build it with our Project Management Software.

With the integration, you can sync all your projects & tasks with Google Calendar. Similarly, if you create any event, or you make any changes in Google Calendar those will instantly be reflected in Orangescrum – SaaS Project Management Tool and vice versa.

Read The Full Article on Orangescrum Blog

How to Get a Failing Project Back On Track

 Project failure can happen to anybody—and to any project. Previously I've shared content on project management, how to run your projects successfully and overall project execution and delivery.

Today, we’ll discuss some of the key reasons behind project failure and how to fix them. Also, some simple yet powerful suggestions to recover your troubled projects. Let's dive in -

Projects fail for many reasons. Stakeholders can change their objectives, team members can be re purposed to projects at imminent risk or of greater business value, budgets can disappear, and misplaced priorities to name a few.

Any of these sound familiar? Are your projects thriving? Or are they suffering from swelling budgets, strained deadlines, and sluggish progress? Assume a situation-

Your project is in trouble. You and your team know it. But somehow you manage to keep it away from your management. Now you want a quick fix. But you couldn't find any. So what can be done to get back on track?

Read The Full Article

Effective Hacks for Improving your Workplace Productivity

 

Workplaces have become the bread and butter of modern-day business dynamics. Having a well-provided, well-established work environment has definitely become a necessity to achieve goals and objectives. Now the important question arises regarding how we can make the most of the time spent in any particular work environment. 

With our lives getting busier and routines getting hectic, let us present some useful hacks that will help you improve your workplace productivity thus answering the aforementioned question.

These hacks wouldn’t just help you as individuals, rather they will help your entire team perform better, therefore improving the overall efficiency of your team. 

Before we move on with our list of hacks, it is important to know that certain aspects like the equipment you use in your work environment also directly affects your productivity levels. For instance, a formidable work station facilitated by high-speed internet providers will also influence your output levels as work tasks can readily be tackled. With that being covered, let us begin our list!

• Multitasking can be hurtful!

Multitasking might sound like the perfect plan to get a number of things done simultaneously, but the reality is quite different. Handling multiple tasks at a given instance might suit just a handful of people while the majority suffers from it. American Psychological Association suggests that only 3% of the entire population can actually benefit from multitasking. When you multitask, not only do you end up losing your focus but it may also cause excessive fatigue that kills your overall productivity.

Read The Full Article