Uniting your team and preparing them to work as a unit is integral to your projects’ success. However, without the best enterprise project management software, you may be doubling your efforts instead of optimizing them.
The right project management software allows you to be more strategic with your resources.
Enterprise project management software is well worth the investment if your goal is to efficiently and effectively plan, track, and manage projects across various departments and resources.
Understanding the concept of enterprise project management
Enterprise project planning requires a project management platform that provides a high-level view of the organization where project managers can track projects across different departments. Coordination across departments is important and should help achieve the organization’s goals and strategy.
If you are venturing into enterprise project management for the first time, remember you will now need to look at dependencies between projects or clusters of projects. The results from a Sales project might feed into the next Marketing initiative and result in a 10% increase in customer acquisition (goal). That is the work you want to align, document and streamline.
Therefore, as enterprise project managers, you need an enterprise project management system that can support this effort of removing silos, aligning teams with common goals and preventing inefficiencies in the organization. Some features that support this are resource management and allocation, enterprise task management, goal tracking, and reporting, among others.
Large enterprise organizations typically run multiple complex projects simultaneously. Although these projects do not necessarily seem connected, they all impact the same enterprise organization. Enterprise project management (EPM) refers to the practice of managing projects on a companywide scale.
It generally involves implementing strategies and processes to streamline and improve the effectiveness of project management on a large scale.
According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), these initiatives can include:
- Using project management software to consolidate multiple projects and make them more visible and trackable across the organization
- Creating a project management department
- Using “stages of growth” models to improve project-management capabilities
When discussing enterprise project management software, they must offer specific enterprise-level solutions. They should not only manage a portfolio of initiatives effectively but also facilitate collaboration among teams and departments.
Types of Enterprise Project Management Software
Individual project management software
For one person who needs lightweight, web-based software to manage their projects, individual project software is a great fit.
It possesses fewer features than more comprehensive project management solutions but is also suitable for managing a project portfolio. If you need a trial or require only basic project management solutions, this is a good place to start.
Collaborative project management software
Collaborative project management software is a perfect option for large teams that need a low-tech solution for their project. It allows all team members to access, view, and collaborate on project tasks easily.
While it also works for smaller teams, it may be insufficient for large teams with diverse projects happening concurrently. Team productivity can suffer if members cannot collate and link data from different projects.
Integrated project management software
A unified, integrated project management solution works best for companies with a large project portfolio or different teams for various projects. It provides a centralized database of information, digital assets, and workflows that can be accessed by different team members based on their requirements.
Users have permission-based access to data and information across projects with an intuitive dashboard. Teams can outline task dependencies, track time, schedule tasks, and collaborate using the built-in messaging functionality.
Project management tools can vary from team to team, but most are computer programs that help users plan, execute, and manage projects in one centralized virtual location.
You can use project management software for any of the following:
- Project planning
- Project scheduling
- Resource allocation and capacity planning
- Budgeting and monitoring project costs
- Project portfolio management
- Business process management
- Workflow management
- Quality management
- Storing and sharing documentation and project records
- Creating and publishing project reports
- Tracking the actual time spent on project tasks
- Analyzing trends and forecasting
Best Enterprise Project Management Software
Monday.com
The monday.com project management software may be an excellent option for larger organizations. It offers an enterprise plan that comes with just about every useful feature you can think of. In addition to general features including task management, time tracking, and collaboration tools, you’ll receive premium integrations with CRM and ERP software.
The enterprise plan also allows for advanced administration settings where you can easily access audit logs and session management. Plus there are advanced reporting options, which include pivot analysis and work performance insights.
Also, if you believe that your credentials have been compromised, you can take advantage of the “panic mode” feature which will completely lock down your account.
ClickUp
Security is of utmost importance for enterprise management software as data will likely be shared across various departments and team members in different locations. For this reason, ClickUp is one of the best enterprise project management software.
It offers encryption and two-factor authentication to keep your information safe and secure. Plus it’s compliant with both HIPAA and GDPR so you can store sensitive health records and personal data without worrying about legal pitfalls. You can also control access permissions throughout the platform.
Additionally, ClickUp thrives in its selection of integrations as it integrates seamlessly with more than a thousand native and third-party integrations. API is also available so you can set up your own integrations as well.
Zoho Projects
Zoho Projects is a cloud-based project management software that offers a scalable work environment. It’s loaded with many features that can come in handy for larger organizations, including resource and time allocation, task management, workflow automation and bug tracking.
Compliance automation is one of the software’s most impressive features. This allows users to automate recurring and repetitive tasks as well as notifications. It’s an effective way to prevent the errors and redundancies that often occur during enterprise-level projects, especially those that have legal compliances to worry about.
Zoho Projects also integrates seamlessly with other Zoho products, such as Zoho Books, Zoho CRM and Zoho Finance.
Smartsheet
Smartsheet is a spreadsheet-style project management tool with a variety of practical features for enterprise organizations. It can calculate data on your behalf across multiple sheets, giving you a break from the complex formulas you may be used to in Excel or Google Sheets.
Smartsheet also offers Critical Path, which outlines all of the tasks that play a role in your ability to complete a project.
If you invest in the Enterprise version of Smartsheet, you’ll enjoy access to Smartsheet Advance. With this feature, you’ll receive administrative capabilities, smart workflows, tighter security and more.
Notion
Notion is a full-scale project management tool that combines notes, documents and wikis. It can help enterprise businesses stay informed and become more productive. The software is organized as pages that you can interlink or nestle as you see fit.
You may click anywhere on a page to add blocks, which can be text, images, to-do lists, videos, Google maps and more. Since there are no restrictions, you have the freedom to customize your pages to meet your unique content creation needs.
As a bonus, the Enterprise-level plan supports an unlimited number of users and includes unlimited file uploads as well as real-time collaboration and sharing.
Asana
Asana is a collaborative enterprise project management software and one of the best, as it makes it easier to assign and manage tasks among team members. You can create tasks with deadlines as well as subtasks to divide your project into more digestible parts.
If your projects involve many repetitive and tedious tasks, you’ll love the task automation feature. You can choose from preset rules or create your own custom rules. Rest assured that as soon as a project or task receives an update, it will be reflected across the tool. In addition, team members can comment on tasks, allowing for optimal transparency and collaboration.
Lastly, Asana offers an extensive template library with more than 140 free templates. Templates are designed for several use cases, such as managing projects and producing creative assets. This can save your team a great deal of time.
Teamwork
Unlike other project management software, Teamwork doesn’t require a steep learning curve. It’s easy to use so every individual within your team shouldn’t have any issues with it. The Scale plan is most appropriate for enterprise organizations that operate like an agency as it offers unlimited projects, 500GB of storage and more advanced admin controls.
This makes it one of the best enterprise project management software.
You can create invoices through the platform and export them to a supported accounting platform, such as FreshBooks and QuickBooks Online. Teamwork also allows you to add and track expenses through the Finance tab.
Benefits of the best enterprise project management software
Although roughly 25% of the gross domestic product of developed nations is spent on or through projects, there is often a lack of alignment among projects within an organization. This divide can result in duplication, wasted effort, missed opportunities, inconsistent decision-making, and other hurdles. Organizations, and project managers within the company, need to ensure all projects are strategically focused on their overarching business objectives.
Enterprise project management software aims to do just that. As Villanova University explains, EPM practices can “identify when projects conflict or duplicate efforts, and they can recognize underfunded projects that might present an opportunity for the organization.” The university cites a potential 20% increase in profits for organizations that employ an EPM system.
The PMI outlines additional benefits of enterprise project management, including:
- Higher-quality output
- Improved productivity
- Reduced impact of skills shortage
- Reduced project risks
- Enhanced reliability of delivery
How to implement the best enterprise project management
Since enterprise project management focuses on the organization’s core mission and strategic objectives, implementation of an EPM system begins with a thorough look at the company’s existing projects and organizational culture. After all, EPM will require adaptability and openness to change.
It is vital to include stakeholders in an EPM system since the end goal is full transparency, wider participation, more project visibility, and increased monitoring. A high level of communication is essential to bring everyone on board and ensure goals and efforts are aligned.
Who should use project management tools?
Anyone who manages projects can benefit from the best project management software. Even if you don’t run formal projects or have the title of “project manager,” project management software can still be useful.
Many companies that don’t run formal projects use software to plan, organize, track, monitor, and execute their work.
These tools come in many different forms, just like projects themselves. For instance, some of your plans may be simple processes that only involve you and another person, while others can take multiple teams months (or even years) to complete. Here are three kinds of tools that can help manage tasks and teamwork.
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