Project Management Trends
(2020): What does the Future
Look Like
Vartika Kashyap
December 15, 2019
Articles, Work and Project Management
Just think of what project management industry looked like ten years ago? Fewer
methodologies, lesser tools, smaller teams, and simpler projects. Cut to 2019,
things have changed tremendously as the teams are no longer smaller and the
projects no longer simpler.
As the old adage goes, “Change is the only constant.” It seems so true for the
project management industry. The project management landscape is changing
rapidly with evolving technologies, tools, and the latest trends. And, the change
doesn’t seem to slow down.
Let’s cut the chase and take a look at the emerging trends in project management
happening all around the world.
Table of Contents [show]
The Most Important Project Management
Trends for 2020
1. The expansion of Artificial Intelligence (AI) &
Automation
There is a lot of buzz around artificial intelligence and its implications. Just like
software development, aerospace, healthcare, and finance, the impact of artificial
intelligence and automation can also be seen and felt in the project management
sector.
Impact: Many companies have already started using AI in project management to
perform their daily tasks that require human effort through task automation. The
effect goes beyond automating simple tasks but is also quite helpful in obtaining
performance insights.
Project managers can use automation to perform complex tasks ranging from
scheduling to data visualization and make informed decisions based on the
captured insights.
What to do about it:
First and foremost, project managers should embrace AI in project management
and then learn how to leverage it for successful project completion.
Once you’ve learned to leverage AI to automate data, project execution will be
much easier than before. It also makes way for building meaningful relationships with
your team members and clients.
Let’s see how AI has enabled better risk estimation: We all know how deadlines
are pushed ahead either due to bad estimation or unknown external factors. With
artificial intelligence, you can get the right estimation of a project’s duration,
costs, and progress helping you predict realistic timelines for your project.
2. Inclusion of hybrid project management approaches
It’s true that not all projects are made equal and not all teams can stick to one
specific methodology. Maybe that’s why the concept of hybrid project
management has been gaining a lot of attention and the number of project
managers and Scrum masters combining more than one methodologies is
increasing day by day.
In simple words, hybrid project management refers to methods combining
approaches from the traditional PM environment and the agile word.
Impact: When you implement the hybrid model, you get to bring all your
projects, tasks, people, and communications at one place helping you make the
right business choices.
For instance, on mixing the traditional approach with the Agile methodology,
team members with different views, working styles can work together in their
own way making way for more stability, engagement, and efficiency.
What to do about it:
Use discretion to understand which methodology works best for a specific
project. Smart project managers are opting for a mix of agile and traditional
methodology to get the best of both worlds.
Tip: We recommend using a traditional approach for simple and clear parts and
agile for complex ones while working in a multi-project environment.
3. The impact of emotional intelligence (EQ)
You might be wondering how the ability to understand and recognize emotions
has something to do with project success? Well, it does play a vital role. When
TeleSmart took a survey, it was found that 58% of respondents believe that
emotional intelligence is one of the strongest predictors of performance irrespective
of the nature of your job.
Impact: Managing projects go beyond defining the scope, making deadlines,
deciding the budget. Project managers have to manage people as well and that
means more complications.
Failing to understand team members’ emotions could lead to a lot of emotional
activity in a team. Obviously, the result isn’t always all hunky-dory.
What to do about it:
To deal with different personalities and ensuring project success, a proper
understanding of emotions (both yours and others) is required – making it a
necessary leadership skill for project managers all over the globe.
Thus, learning the art of emotions and what drives people is becoming more
important than ever to predict project success in the future.
4. More focus on data analytics and numbers
Project management involves a lot of data. Project managers are increasingly
leveraging data insights to make informed decisions to handle projects in a better
way and increase business growth.
Impact: Whether it’s project planning, quality management, or risk estimation, the
use of big data analysis has already started shaping the project management
world. The collected data is useful to learn how to form teams, the size of the
team, how to include and position team members, skill sets needed to manage
projects better.
What to do about it:
The smart and wise ones leverage the technological advancements to stay
relevant. Data analytics, if used the right way has the power to produce a lot of
business value.
“What gets measured, gets managed” — Peter Drucker, management guru
If you’re someone who doesn’t like numbers, find the tools that can do the work
for you. Project analytics tools offer strategic parameters that could help you get
the complete picture of all project activities. Get high-level data and custom
reports with tech tools such as Google Data Studio, Tableau to visualize data.
5. Advanced project management tools and solutions
In today’s digital era, project management tools have become an indispensable part
of project management. The numbers tell the same story. According to a research,
77 percent of high-performing projects use project management software to plan,
execute, and control all aspects of the project management.
Impact: Project management tools and solutions have always been the game-
changing factor. Below are some ways how these tools are making positive
changes in project management.
Project planning: Uses data from previous projects to plan better
Scheduling and time tracking: Keeps track of time spent on tasks and
manages scheduled events, meetings, milestones, and deadlines
Communication and collaboration: Lets you share critical information with
team members, clients, stakeholders
Budgets and deadlines: Helps you deliver projects within the allocated
budget
Progress tracking: Keeps track of the ongoing projects if they are on track
or not, if resources need to be adjusted or not.
What to do about it:
It goes without saying that project management tools are of much help to project
managers to plan and deliver projects on time. They also give team members a
platform to communicate and collaborate at a single place.
How ProofHub helps you keep up with the changing
trends
Investing in a good project management software is the need of the hour. We are
going to give you a handful of reasons why ProofHub is worthy to be added in
your toolkit.
Let’s take a look at them:
Gives you ultimate control on your projects with custom roles
Keeps your work organized so that you don’t have to worry about what to
do next
Simplifies task management by letting you create tasks, subtasks, recurring
tasks, assign and share them with team members, clients, and stakeholders
Provides a visual timeline of tasks, projects, and resources to see who’s
doing what
Clear insights on resource utilization and project progress
Keeps your files and documents organized
Lets you mention team members for quicker collaboration
Keeps the account information safe with IP restriction
Integrates with Google Calendar, iCal, Google Drive Box, Onedrive,
Dropbox, and Outlook
We have a lot of features that might interest you and your teams, check all
ProofHub features here.
6. Increased remote working
It’s no news that the number of professionals opting to work remotely has sky-
rocketed in the last couple of years. And the trend is here to stay. According to
Gallup,
“Remote working has been on the rise since 2012: from 39% in 2012 to 43% in
2016. The desire to work remotely is here to stay and it isn’t limited to a few
select industries.”
Impact: Remote project management offers many benefits. The first one being
more flexibility in the schedule and second, not having to commute to the office
every day. Project costs are also reduced. Plus, you get an opportunity to work a
diverse talent pool.
What to do about it:
To bring out the best in your remote team, I have penned down some practical
tips:
1. Weekly or biweekly check-in meetings and calls to know how things are
progressing
2. Make team members accountable by asking for status updates
3. Start using online collaboration tools such as ProofHub to collaborate with team
members and stay on top of things
4. Hold performance reviews four times a year
What do you anticipate for the future?
Along with these trends, you might observe a considerable rise in millennial
project managers, PMOs, more focus on cybersecurity measures. Paying
attention to these trends is what that’s going to help project managers lead with
success.
Vartika Kashyap
Vartika Kashyap is the Chief Marketing Officer at ProofHub and has been one of the
LinkedIn Top Voices in 2018. Her articles are inspired by office situations and
work-related events. She likes to write about productivity, team building, work
culture, leadership, entrepreneurship among others and contributing to a better
workplace is what makes her click.
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