“Tasks expand to the amount of time we give them” asserts the Parkinson’s Rule. I remember first reading about this in the Four-Hour Workweek from Tim Ferris. Think about it - what tasks have expanded to the amount of time you have given them?
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Whether you are a solopreneur or work with a VA or other freelance members, having a variety of tools to manage projects is key. These tools are likely to be virtual so you can share them with others, and you may have different tools for different purposes.
In selecting a tool consider:

• What’s going to work best?
• What are the requirements? I.e. How will we use the tool?
• What’s important to note about this?
• What is the Project Scope – Time, Budget and Effort?
• What is the progress?
• How much time is it really taking?
• What are the project requirements?

Two tools I like to use the capture and communicate projects can include:

1. Asana – Asana is another great project resource, and free of charge (at least at this stage for some functionality). Asana has the advantage of being able to segment what you share with whom, so if you work with a VA and also a graphic designer you can consider what you share with each one or both. Asana allows you to upload documents, set deadlines and also assign responsibilities.
2. Trello – While I use Trello more for program design, I love the visual interface of Trello. It visually breaks down more complex ideas, and tasks into smaller particles. Consider how Trello might support you with your programs or projects. If you are using Trello – please feel free to comment and share with us how you are using it.
3. Good old-fashioned tables – As a new project manager in the early 1990s, it was important to document, document, document. As Word Processors were coming into being, accessible capturing of information was becoming the norm and the priority. Almost three decades later I still return back to the basics and many of my team members say they love the simplicity and clarity of a one-page weekly project outline. It doesn’t have to be super complicated – I usually have 4 columns for:

• Task - What is required?
• Description – More detail about the task – project requirements, what will success look like with the end product? Get granular here and clarify your assumptions!
• Resources needed - highlighting any documents needed, or resources to use, or people to reach out to.
• Deadline – What is the deadline for the task? When it is required? Be realistic and also think about what happens if that deadline is not met. What ripple effect could it create?

What are the tools you want to start incorporating into your work this year, to make projects flow more smoothly?
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Enjoy your week,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CPCC
Author multiple books including the Coaching Business Builder Workbook and Planner (2018), Effective Group Coaching (2010)
Potentials Realized
Phone: 416-996-8326
Looking for some daily focus around your work? Join me over on Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder for a daily question or prompt as part of the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series. 
Check out the November 2018 CBB Book Club Call entitled "2019 Planning. Already?". You can view it here.

This week our attention is going to shift to quickly explore 5 key skills in project management. Whether you are creating an e-book, designing a new program or deciding on new systems for your business, as solopreneurs we are regularly managing projects as a team of one.
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In project management, historically, the foundation has been that for any project there is a triple constraint – time, budget and scope. Like a triangle, it is said that these things are fixed (at least in traditional project management). So if my budget gets reduced, it might take a little longer to do things as we now need to do them in-house OR the scope of the project may change given that we no longer have resources to complete a six month project, so instead we may need to do a three month project.
 
With this in mind the first project management skill I think is important is getting good at identifying project requirements.

• What is the project?
• What are the deadlines?
• What are the milestones along the way? These are checkpoint activities where you can see progress?
• What resources are needed? Project manager of all kinds have operated in this framing of being aware of the triple constraint ….

Other key questions to be asking here are:

• What is the project scope?
• What’s involved with it?
• What is IN focus? What is outside of focus (or scope)?

 
Spending additional time making sure we have this first step of project requirements right, helps to make the rest of it flow more smoothly (usually!).
 
It was in this phase of project identification that I first became aware of the adage that “10 minutes of planning can save 2 hours of unfocused effort”. So true!
 
With this is in mind, let’s look at five key project management skills that solopreneurs will want to boost:

1. Knowledge of self and skills – Self- awareness is key to solopreneurial success. Knowing what we are good at, what we can learn, and when we need to reach out to others, can make the difference between a project that flows and one that gets deadlocked or becomes a source of frustration. In knowing ourselves, we want to be able to identify key skills which are important in the immediate term, as well as ones we will be using regularly. Creating a robust network to reach out to, to find others short term who can round out of skill needs, is critical for solopreneurial success. “No person is an island!”.
2. Time estimation – Estimating the amount of time required for a task is also critical. One part of this equation is getting better at knowing how long tasks really do take. Part of this is experience, and we may have peers and mentors that can advise us. It can be useful to build in some contingency time for our own learning curve, given that tasks will take longer to complete the first few times we do them, or if we do them infrequently. I’m thinking of a recent experience I had where I had to set up a welcome auto-responder for a give-away. I do this about once a year and while I should “retain it”, it was as if the task was totally new!
3. Clarifying what’s required - Given that most of us are working on our own, we will be needing to reach out to others to help us get work done. Whether it’s going to a site like Fiverr or Upwork, finding good experts (graphic designers, financial experts) that can work with us to make our projects happen, is crucial. In making this successful, we need to be good at clarifying what’s required (think – What will a successful end result for this project/task look like? – be specific, get granular), as well as finding people.
4. Relationship Building and Negotiation – At the end of the day, things need to get done and projects need to get completed. If we can’t complete projects, it may have a significant impact on the business. As solopreneurs, we can’t go to a boss to negotiate the triple constraint – i.e. give me more time to complete this or give me more money – we have that under our control. In some ways this makes project management that much easier. What is may mean is that we need to go out and enroll others to our projects – requiring both relationship-building and negotiation skills.

What do you see as essential project management skills for solopreneurs? Which ones have you been leaning into as a project team of one?

Share with us using the comments below.

Jennifer

​Jennifer Britton, PCC, CPCC
Author multiple books including the Coaching Business Builder Workbook and Planner (2018), Effective Group Coaching (2010)
Potentials Realized
Phone: 416-996-8326
Check out the November 2018 CBB Book Club Call entitled "2019 Planning. Already?". You can view it here.

Most coaches, solopreneurs, and business owners are going to be involved in a variety of projects during the coming year. What can make it challenging is the fact that you might be working alone on a project, moving it ahead in small increments OR working with an entire virtual team.

Many of the same principles apply from program design (a focus here this past fal) to project planning, and we’re going to widen our focus a bit. From Lean, to Agile, to Six Sigma, larger and smaller organizations of all kinds have been iterating the way they work.
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As coaches we may be involved in projects big and small – from creating a new digital product, to organizing a series of workshop. Honing our skills in project planning and project management is very important.
 As you step into your quarterly projects consider asking, reflecting and fostering discussion around these questions related to project planning:

10 Questions to ask:

1. What is the end result we are looking for?
2. What is important?
3. What are the non-negotiables?
4. What resources are going to help us get there?
5. What are the triple constraints? What are the timelines, the resources, and budget we have to operate within?
6. What milestones are we aiming towards? How clear is everyone in terms of what success will look like around these?
7. What could pull us off course?
8. What will help us stay focused?
9. What communication and feedback loops have we put into place?
10. What’s going to support that effort?

 
What other questions would you ask around the current projects you are working on?

Let us know what projects you have on the docket by sharing in the comments!
 
Best wishes,
Jennifer
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"The best companies never transform to greatness in one fell swoop. There is no single defining action, no grand program, no one killer innovation, no solitary lucky break, no miracle moment. Sustainable transformations [to greatness] follow a predictable pattern of build-up and breakthrough. Like pushing on a giant heavy flywheel, it takes a lot of effort to get the thing moving at all, but with persistent pushing in a consistent direction over a long period of time, the flywheel builds momentum, eventually hitting a point of breakthrough." (Jim Collins, Good to Great). 

As you think abut your focus this year, what is the one thing you want to do consistently throughout they year, to start generating the momentum Jim Collins talks about. Perhaps it’s regularly focusing on:
Writing – What is the book you have in you that is waiting to get out? Is there a series of articles or blog posts?
Photography – Are you looking to share more about what you do, who you are, and the impact your conversations are having through photography? Instagram continues to grow in terms of popularity and video engagement is critical.
Building community – Are you looking to host a group this year? Life, paid, or on Facebook? Are you looking to network more and build relationships virtually or in person? What would consistent action in creating community look like for you?
Speaking – What could a focus on speaking look like for you this year? What topics would you present on? What would the top 3 bullet points be? Who is your audience?

If there was one thing you could do consistently every day this year, what would it be? Schedule it in now, and notice what happens!

One thing that I'll be doing this year for all 52 weeks of the year is sharing a weekly focus for your business and professional growth called 52 Weeks of Planning, Doing and Tracking. It's a Compendium to Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack. If you have enjoyed reading the CBB and want a deeper, or more bite-sized dive, this is for you!  Check out the kick off of the  weekly blog posts here. They will be published on Friday morning over at the PlanDoTrack Blog and will be of interest to readers of both the PDT and Coaching Business Builder.

Here at the CBB Blog, our attention this month is going to shift over to annual planning, and project management. Be sure to check out the 1st of two January calls on Creating Your Annual To-Do List at my YouTube channel on the Coaching Business Builder Playlist here. The first call is being held later this morning - January 7th at 11 am ET at my zoom room (270-302-0415). Hope you'll drop in and join us!

Best,
Jennifer

The tagline for Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack is "Daily Steps + Consistent Action = Momentum". Over the last few decades I have seen as a coach, and in my former work as a program manager, how small steps every day, really add up for businesses of all sizes - micro-enterprise, solopreneurs, and larger businesses.

With this in mind, this year I'm hosting a new social challenge I'm calling 1 Biz Step a Day. Each month I'm offering daily prompts to support you to get into small steps around your business. Let's see what consistent actions it leads to and what momentum it creates!

I hope that you will follow along and share your progress, not only here at the blog, but also over on Instagram at @CoachingBizBuilder and the Effective Group Coaching Facebook Page.

Download a copy of the 1 Biz Step a Day for January here. The focus is on business fundamentals - communication, systems and other basics. Putting the foundations in order helps move things more quickly, later in the year.

ENJOY!
Jennifer

PS - Later this week I'll be kicking off another year-long project you will probably be interested in. It's a 52 Week planning series I'll be sharing over at my sibling "PlanDoTrack" Website. I'm calling it the 52 Weeks of Planning, Doing and Tracking.
Consider it a weekly compendium to the Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack Workbooks - structured activities and prompts to get you working through your workbook and planner. First prompt will be Friday at 6 am! Read more about it here.

Best wishes for 2019,
Jennifer Britton
Author of Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), 
Potentials Realized - Supporting Coaches, Businesses, Leaders and Teams 
Is 2019 your year to take it ahead? Join me for one of our two annual groups - The Learning Lab and Design Studio (focusing on program design) or the Coaching Biz Growth Lab (focusing on coaching business development)
Phone: 416-996-8326