Project Management

You plan your projects; why not your small business?

If you have been a part of a project you know the detailed planning that goes into it. Right from business analysis to scoping to resource allocation and testing and deployment – you are aware of the work that goes into making a project successful. So if you can do that for a project, why would you not do that for your small business?

Whether you are an entrepreneur starting out or have been in business for a while, it helps to think of your small business operations as a series of projects. The result of one or more project/s acts like an input to other project/s. And like any project, you need to judiciously manage time, quality and cost of all projects.

Project Examples

Some examples of the projects that I can think of for your small business are:

• Competition analysis project
• Product development project
• Develop pricing project
• Lead generation project (quarterly, semi-annually, annually)
• Web design & SEO project
• Marketing research project

I am sure you can think of many such projects for your small business. Some projects may be small while others require significant resources. Remember, the final goal of any project is to meet project objectives. So defining project objectives at the outset is crucial.

Benefits

Don’t believe those who say not to analyze and crystallize your plans before jumping into a venture. Proper planning is half the battle. When you think of your small business operations as projects:

• you bring some discipline into the process
• you set deadlines and work towards them
• your business is now a series of goals and challenges. You love challenges, don’t you?
• you can manager your projects better. If you have delegated tasks, weekly project meetings can help you determine progress
• you can track time and allocate costs to each project

Now that you have started thinking about your small business as projects, what other benefits do you see?