You've managed an interactive project or two before, but it could have gone better — want to find out where you might improve? This class is designed to give an overview of the best practices for project management. From developing a solid project foundation to improving communication and collaboration within your team, this class will provide a clearer idea of where you should focus your energy as a project manager. Want to learn more? Join Front Row today and access on-demand videos, livestreams, and much more: http://bit.ly/1aqAivV

1. PROJECT MANAGEMENT
BEST PRACTICES
Brock Boddie

2. GET THE FULL EXPERIENCE:
LEARN WHAT YOU WANT,
WHEN YOU WANT
Unlimited access to all upcoming live streams
On-demand streaming classes taught by top
practitioners
A growing video library, updated weekly
Get access for only $25 USD/month.
No risk—you can cancel at any time!
START 14-DAY FREE TRIAL

3. AGENDA
‣ Who I am
‣ Basic project management
‣ Tactics
‣ Project strategies
‣ Personal strategies
2

4. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Who I am.
3

5. INTRODUCTION
I’M BROCK.
‣ I work for Huge as a Program Director, working on clients like
Four Seasons
‣ 11 years managing interactive projects, large and small.
‣ Can code HTML/CSS and enough JavaScript and PHP to be a
nuisance.
‣ Majored in Philosophy & Psychology and Masters in International
Relations.
4

6. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Basic PM stuff.
5

7. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
BASICS:
1.Scope
2.People
3.Timeline
4.Budget
6

8. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
7
WHAT ARE WE DOING?
Scope is the circumscription of all that you are doing in all its glorious
detail.
For example:
‣ More scope almost always means more time.
‣ More scope also almost always means more budget.
‣ More scope may also mean that you need more resources.

9. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
BASICS:
1.Scope
2.People
3.Timeline
4.Budget
8

10. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
IF ONLY THIS PERSON WERE ON MY TEAM…
You’ve got to have the right people in place to get the job done.
Forcing someone to do something they don’t do isn’t a recipe for
success and can impact your project negatively.
For example:
‣ More people almost always means more budget.
‣ More people can mean that you can handle more scope.
‣ More people can mean less time – but…
9

11. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
One woman can have a baby in
nine months, but nine women
cannot have a baby in one month.
10

12. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Some things just take time.
11

13. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
BASICS:
1.Scope
2.People
3.Timeline
4.Budget
12

14. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
DONE YET?
Time is related to scope, budget and resources in some pretty
key ways:
‣ More time almost always means more budget.
‣ Larger scope almost always means more time.
‣ More resources can mean less time (see previous slide).
13

15. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
BASICS:
1.Scope
2.People
3.Timeline
4.Budget
14

16. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
15
SCHMUDGET.
Your budget is obviously the anticipated price of the scope that you
have committed to. Budget relates to the other areas in these high
level ways:
‣ More time almost always means more budget.
‣ Larger scope almost always means more time.
‣ More resources can mean more budget — but with some work it’s a
trade-off between time, resource price, and budget.

17. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Tactics.
16

18. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Starting a project.
17

19. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
18
KNOW YOUR BUSINESS’ STRATEGY.
If they’ll tell you, that is. How does your business view this SOW/account:
‣ Are we trying to develop a long term relationship?
‣ How much margin are we willing to give up to make the client
happy?
‣ Do we just want to finish out this project?

20. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
KNOW YOUR SCOPE.
Know what you’re on the hook for and what you’re not:
‣ What you said you’d do.
‣ What they agreed they’d do.
‣ Your documented assumptions.
‣ What its weaknesses are that work for you.
‣ What its weaknesses are that work against you.
19

21. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
CREATE A SCHEDULE.
‣ Make it specific.
Very specific.
20

22. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
21
HAVE A PROJECT PLAN IN MIND.
ANNOTATIONS
Visual Design
Development
Quality
Assurance
REMEDIATION
Review
Wireframing
UAT
Launch
Kickoff
Requirements
Gathering/
Discovery
SPECIFICATIONS

23. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Operating a project.
22

24. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
23
ADAPT TO YOUR CLIENT’S PROCESS.
They probably have a way of doing things and they’re not looking for
you to change it — yet.
‣ Research: Figure out what they do and why they do it.
‣ Reduce friction: Adapt your process to accommodate if you can.
‣ Evolve: Keep them aware of inefficiencies that you believe they could
change easily.
‣ Don’t tell them about everything they do wrong. It burns good will
you’ll need when something is really messed up.

25. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
MAINTAIN YOUR SCHEDULE.
You’re not organized enough to keep track of everything. Use your
schedule to:
‣ Track expected resource utilization.
‣ Measure deviations from the original scope.
‣ Focus on tasks that are relevant today, this week, or this month.
‣ Illustrating the down-stream impacts of deviations from the plan.
24

26. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
25
COUNT THE HOURS.
An essential task for projects with development; you’ve only budgeted
so many hours or days to complete the scope. Keep track of how
they’ll be consumed.
‣ How many hours of development and QA resources do you have?
‣ How many hours will each of your features take to build and test?
‣ How accurate are your estimates?

27. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
TRACK YOUR BUDGET.
Calculate the following at least once a week:
‣ Actual hours, cost and billed hours to-date.
‣ Forecasted hours, cost and billed to complete.
‣ Actual+Forecasted hours, cost and billed.
26

28. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
SEND WEEKLY STATUS REPORTS.
It holds everyone accountable. Include:
‣ What you accomplished this week.
‣ What you expect to accomplish next week.
‣ What you missed this week.
‣ What’s at risk.
‣ How you intend to mitigate the risk.
If you’re doing things correctly, your client and team will never see
anything surprising in this report.
27

29. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
28
KEEP THE PROJECT ORGANIZED.
Imagine a year from now, someone wanted you to find that file that
you sent them on that day that was about that thing — how would you
find it?
‣ File naming a key. Example:
DDMMYY_Deliverable_FileName_Version
‣ Folder Organization. Design it for someone who doesn’t know your
project.
‣ Insist that team members abide the conventions.

30. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Managing your team.
29

31. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
30
HAVE SHORT, DAILY MEETINGS.
We call them “scrums,” but whatever you call them, get together with
your team regularly to track progress.
‣ Use your meeting notes, schedule, and actions to track people’s
progress and ask:
‣ What are you working on?
‣ What do you need?
‣ Are you getting it?
‣ How can I help you?
‣ Use that meeting only to track progress

32. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
31
ASK FOR DATES AND DEPENDENCIES.
People don’t usually volunteer when something will get done, so you
must get them to estimate and commit. Some rebuttals:
‣ “Just give me your best guess — it helps me plan subsequent tasks.”
‣ “Is it because this one task is actually many tasks? Let’s break it
down and estimate those tasks.”
‣ “Try working on this problems for an hour or two and giving me an
estimate then.”

33. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
32
TAKE MEETING NOTES AND SEND THEM.
You write the history for your project. Some tactics:
‣ After a meeting, always send your notes to the participants, breaking
out:
‣ Decisions
‣ Actions — with names and delivery dates
‣ Gives participants and opportunity to correct the record.
‣ Send hot lists.

34. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
HAVE INTERNAL REVIEWS. OF EVERYTHING.
You’re the line between what gets shown to the client and what
doesn’t. Ask yourself:
‣ Is the deliverable complete?
‣ Is this the best work your team can do?
‣ What is the client going to pick on?
‣ What will our response be to those issues?
‣ More importantly: am I ready to put my name on this?
33

35. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
EVALUATE STAFFING.
Especially on small projects, every team member is key to your
success. you must have the right team members to get the job done.
34

36. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Managing your client.
35

37. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
36
REVIEW YOUR PROJECT PLAN.
With the client. Sounds crazy. I know. It helps:
‣ Show the client what you’re doing.
‣ Show the client what you need them to do.
‣ Make the schedule be the bad guy instead of you (particularly when
they miss dates).
‣ Keep your head up and focus on something other than the
immediate term.

38. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
TALK TO THE CLIENT FREQUENTLY.
Maybe or maybe not daily, but at least weekly outside of scheduled
reviews. Use the call to:
‣ Talk about your risks and how you hope to mitigate them (perhaps
with their help).
‣ As what risks they see.
‣ Manage expectations.
‣ Ask what they need you to do that you’re not.
‣ Build trust.
37

39. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
COMMUNICATE APPROPRIATELY.
Know how your roll affects how your communication will affect the
project. This encompasses several things:
‣ Messages that best come from a day-to-day PM: risks, delays,
mistakes, status, changes in scope.
‣ Messages that come from someone not day-to-day: changes in
scope, resolving contract disputes.
38

40. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
When it’s bad, talk more often, not less.
39

41. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Project strategies.
40

42. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Long term goal.
41

43. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
FOCUS ON YOUR LONG TERM GOAL.
Say you’re trying to launch a site:
‣ Always look through the lens of your goal:
‣ Is this piece of work: Essential? Important? A nice-to-have? None
of the above?
‣ Give your work attention in proportion to priority.
‣ See what connects today’s work and your goal.
42

44. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Remember:
If it doesn’t connect to your goal,
it gets no attention.
43

45. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Opportunity cost.
44

46. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Defined:
The cost of an activity in terms
of the next-best forgone activity.
45

47. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
46
PROVE IT.
Everyone will always be asking you to do things that you think aren’t going to help
your goal. Prove it.
Example:
Client wants to know why X area of the project has slowed down. At first blush, you
know it’s because they were slow in getting your X, Y and Z, but there may be other
reasons.
You say, “Here’s the high-level answer, but in order to get you a more detailed
answer, I’ll have to take my tech lead off of daily development project work for eight
hours. That could delay the project by eight hours. I don’t believe there will be a
corresponding efficiency reached as a result of getting this answer for you. Do you
still want this answered?”

48. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Process as protection.
47

49. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
48
NOT A NASTY WORD.
‣ Allows your team to focus on the long term goal, while you get what
you need. (e.g., morning scrums)
‣ A good process is practically invisible (i.e., low overhead).
‣ Articulate the physics of your project (e.g., deadlines, the process,
how your client works) and make sure those physics stay predictable
and constant.

50. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
49
EXAMPLES.
‣ 15 minute “scrum” with the core team every morning. Ask:
‣ What are you working on?
‣ Do you need help?
‣ Are you on track?
‣ What can I do for you?
‣ Hot lists sent at the beginning of every week detailing who needs to
accomplish what and by when.
‣ Have the work in presentation form one full day before meeting with
the client.
‣ Develop annotations in conjunction with ID and Design.

51. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Shelter your team.
50

52. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
51
LET THEM DO WHAT THEY’RE GOOD AT.
‣ Designers, developers, copywriters — dealing with the process,
budget or project politics isn’t their job.
‣ Let your team members focus (e.g., don’t drag them into five
meetings in a day, stop by their desk every three hours, et cetera).
‣ Provide your team with the most complete and relevant information
so that they can make great decisions, too. Put it together for them
as best you can.
‣ Set up consequences for inefficient resources.

53. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Relationships.
52

54. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
53
Graham Arader:
Strangers don’t give you money, friends do.

55. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
PUT IN THE EFFORT.
Ultimately, project management is about managing people.
‣ No matter what, your project will be easier with friends than with
enemies. But the key element is mutual respect.
‣ Confront people on your own team (in a neutral environment) who
are abusive or engage in inappropriate behavior. Do not tolerate it.
‣ Always be patient — even if it takes 500 different ways of
communicating the same thing.
54

56. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Personal strategies.
55

57. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Own it.
56

58. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Ownership:
If it’s bad, it’s your fault.
If it’s amazing, it’s your fault.
57

59. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
SMALL TIME CEO.
‣ Think of yourself as an actual business owner.
‣ What do you do if this is your money, your time, your scope.
‣ No matter what, the buck has to stop with you.
58

60. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Demand transparency.
59

61. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
“If you tell the truth, you
don’t have to remember anything.”
– Mark Twain
60

62. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
FICTION IS COMPLICATED.
But a lot less complicated than reality.
In order to actually solve problems,
there should only be the known and
unknowns. Never misdirection. Insist
on it from everyone.
61

63. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Be curious.
62

64. your performance, your team members, how does
AfterEffects work? how do you put together CSS and
HTML to build a page? Does it make sense to build this
feature in JavaScript? why does my developer think
that this thing that looks like one feature to me is
actually three features to her? why does it matter that
it’s three features? what does my developer need to
develop this feature? what process do my team
members find most efficient? why is our development
process this way? what does the business need? how
does my client’s business actually work? what is the
project history? in what ways could my last project
could have been more successful? what can I do to make

65. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Think quickly.
64

66. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
65
MAKE PROJECT DECISIONS.
Not arbitrary ones, of course — as quickly as possible.
‣ Collect relevant information, organize it, and make a decision — and
be able to justify that decision in facts or grounded suppositions.
‣ Approach decisions from the perspective of whether or not the
decisions will have made sense a month from now based on what you
knew at the time you made the decision.
‣ Document your big decisions and the process that went into it.

67. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Remember:
Indecision is a decision.
66

68. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Think solutions.
67

69. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
When you give someone a problem
without a proposed set of solutions,
you’re making it their problem.
68

70. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
69
HOW TO SOLVE IT.
In 1945, George Pólya wrote a nice book called “How To Solve It”. It’s
about solving math problems, but it can be abstracted from math and
be useful for PMs, too.
‣ Understand the problem
‣ Devise a plan
‣ Carry out the plan
‣ Review and Revise the plan

71. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Carry water for your team
and be the catalyst.
70

72. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Communicate.
71

73. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
72
COMMUNICATE EFFECTIVELY.
‣ Know how and when to communicate: the point of talking, emailing,
or presenting is to actually communicate.
‣ Know who you’re talking to and where they’re coming from;
anticipate the discourse you’ll have with someone before having it.
You may save two people’s time.
‣ Have some communication strategy in mind.
‣ People tend to make better decisions with better information.

74. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
73
COMMUNICATE EFFECTIVELY.
IN PERSON.
INSTANT MESSAGE (PHONE).
‣ Words
‣ Words
‣ Visual Aids
‣ Visual Aids
‣ Voice
‣ (Voice)
‣ Face
‣ Body Language
‣ Shared Physical Experience

75. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Attitude.
74

77. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
76
YOUR ATTITUDE MATTERS.
If you’re not calm and composed, you’re not going to get calm and
composed from your team.
The long-term solutions to your problems do not come from your
urgency and panic.
Your generosity (of time, effort, et cetera) will pay off in a better project.

78. PROJECT MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES
Thanks.
78