Savvy small business owners understand that technology can help them streamline processes and manage their teams more effectively. But when it comes to project management tools, there are so many different apps and software options available it can be hard to decide on which one is right for your business.
Find out about the top project management software tools and apps for small businesses below.
Project management is the principle of applying processes, skills, tools, techniques, and deliverables to activities within a business or organization in order to achieve the desired goals or outcomes.
Small business project management uses these management features to track internal processes and improve workflows and team communication overall.
Larger organizations will often have dedicated project managers – employees whose role is to oversee the day-to-day running of projects. However, for most small businesses it simply isn’t cost-effective or necessary to employ someone for this role. Project tracking software and project planning apps offer a great alternative to hiring.
Project management techniques and tools can help with:
Before settling on specific management tools, you should consider what features would help your business reach its needed goals. These are the top project management software features you should look for:
Time tracking helps you organize your team’s time spent on projects and understand how long certain activities are taking to better manage resources and work more efficiently. Project management software can also double as a time management programme for smaller businesses that might not have timesheets set up.
Project management software should be easy to use and offer a quick learning curve to master. You’ll also want to consider features like a drag and drop interface for employee scheduling. If you find the interface confusing or complicated it could waste more time than it saves, and lead to frustration. The best project tracking software will offer a 30 day free trial so you can see the interface for yourself and practise using it before committing.
A project planning app should work seamlessly with other programmes your business uses day-to-day. Whether that’s by sending email notifications, connecting accounts across platforms, or allowing users to upload documents and share information. Multi-app syncing makes it easy to cover all your business processes with fewer gadgets.
Remote workers, mobile workers, and in-house teams – in the 21st century all types of workers use their smartphones to keep on top of workloads. App integration will enable your team to access their project activity feed whenever they need it, and from wherever they are. Mobile apps are perfect for keeping your team connected while accessing real-time updates.
This feature enables you to assign tasks to team members at the click of a button. The app will send notifications to them via the app while providing them with all the documents they will need to complete their assigned responsibilities. Easily reassign last-minute tasks to ensure all parts of a project are completed.
Instant messaging for business enables your team to stay in touch with each other regarding work tasks. A project management system should always offer collaboration tools such as a chat feed. This allows employees to ask quick questions and get answers immediately, so you don’t feel pressured to check your emails every other minute of the day.
From time spent on specific clients to the breakdown of individual tasks, the best project management tools will gather this data and present it in easy-to-understand reports to give an accurate overview of your team’s progress. Reporting functions are always important as they can provide a clear overview and business insights to help you improve processes.
Seeing as there are multiple people that work within your business or make up a project team, project management software solutions should offer multi-access and unlimited users. How can you effectively conduct work management of your team when not everyone can access the software in question?
In this day and age, cloud-based project management has become a necessary part of the role. With quality management software you shouldn’t need to download everything onto your laptop or smartphone in order to access it. If it’s cloud-based, you can access whichever programmes or files you need on the go, without them maxing out your memory.
Now that you know what project management software features to look out for, you can shop around for the best apps on the market. When it comes to small businesses, these are some of the top project management apps available in Canada today:
Tracking projects with QuickBooks Time couldn’t be easier. Our software allows you to track time, delegate actionable, chat with your team, create live reports, and so much more, all through our intuitive interface for desktop and mobile applications.
The QuickBooks time tracking app can improve payroll, profitability, and productivity while saving you time and helping to integrate remote and mobile workers. Plus, our mobile app tracks time even when WiFi and cell coverage isn’t available, so you’ll always have accurate data no matter your signal.
Asana enables you to map out every step of a project and organize all the details in one place. The intuitive interface lets you create to-do lists, drag and drop tasks and assign tasks to team members.
Colour-coded and with multiple different ways to view workloads, from calendar format to charts and lists, it’s a software that allows every team member to personalize and interact with it in the way that suits them best.
These visualization tools work much like Kanban boards, which are project management tools that help visualize the workload and workflow using cards and graphs for improved efficiency. The best project management software will provide a kanban board feature to boost teamwork projects and task management.
Tools and web apps like Trello can help manage communication between team members while also boosting productivity across the board. Sign on to this project management solution and use the built-in workflow automation tool to streamline those tedious tasks for quicker accomplishments. Divide project deliverables into cards to allow team members to track, edit, complete, and comment on deliverables.
This project management software is tailored for accounting firms, allowing them to manage workflows, communicate with teams and deliver top-notch client work from anywhere. Karbon lets you manage budgets, actuals, timesheets and analysis all in the same place as your work and collaboration, making it a great project management tool in the time of remote working.
With features like workflow automation, project management, client management, performance analytics, email insights and team collaboration, you’ll wonder how your accountancy firm ever operated without it.
This software can even sync with QuickBooks Time to provide full coverage for project and employee tracking.
If you work in the service industry, simPRO is the project management software for you. Tailored for service industries like construction and maintenance, it includes features like:
simPro also connects with accounting platforms like Quickbooks Time to help streamline your workflow and make life easier.
Sign up for a free trial of QuickBooks Time today to see this software’s integration capabilities today.
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