3 TYPES OF VISUAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Reference: https://asana.com/resources/visual-project-management-kanban-timeline-calendar

3 ways to visualize project progress
1. Project timelines and charts
2. Kanban boards
3. Project calendars

Visual project management
allows you to see your project tasks and workload displayed in a visual format.
When you can see your work, it’s easier to streamline efforts across your team,
stay on track, and
avoid potential bottlenecks.

Often, this is done as a project timeline, calendar, or Kanban boards.

non visual PM: tasks, deadlines, and team members
visual PM: same, but in a way that’s
easier to track, view, and use.

provides at-a-glance insight
into what everyone on your team is working on,
when project deliverables are due,
what your team milestones are

a more interactive form of work management
makes it easier to collaborate

– Getting faster insights.
quickly and easily digest information when the project status, metrics, and project tasks all in one place.

Reducing bottlenecks.
– Team members and other project stakeholders can access the information they need, when they need it, reducing potential bottlenecks.

A project’s lifecycle
From assigning project tasks,
to connecting with communication tools, and
ending with reporting,

Coordinating as a team.
cross-functional collaboration
by seeing everything in one place

Identifying potential blockers earlier.
Visualize project dependencies,
milestones, and
blockers
so you can address problems before they happen.

3 popular ways to visualize project progress:
Timelines (or Gantt charts)
Kanban boards
Project calendars

project management software/tool,
customizable,
add automation, and
use intuitive features, such as drag and drop builders.

Asana
Lists,
Boards,
Calendar, and
Timeline View

visualization tools

1. Project timelines (Gantt chart) and charts
– organize project details in a bar chart
> to show when each task or deliverable in your project needs to be completed and how long each task will take.

if:
– have a timely project with tasks that need to hit their deadlines

– better allocate resources, staff team members on different steps, and visualize dependencies.

When not to use project timelines or Gantt charts
– if your tasks don’t have start and end dates, there isn’t much to
– a project with a lot of daily tasks or one where the due dates are flexible,
THEN: visualize your work in project calendar or Kanban board.

Example of a project timeline
– a product launch.
– cross-functional team, incorporating team members from product, engineering, marketing, sales, customer support to pull off a successful launch
– working with so many different stakeholders, the project is bound to be complicated
– A timeline
gives everyone a visual of the project progress and
roadmap so you’re all on the same page.

better coordinate resource management,
forecast timing to hit your milestones,
see project dependencies (to proactively unblock them), and
view all start and end dates in one place.

This way, everyone on your project team has a clear view of your plan and what’s required to make it a success from start to finish.

after a timeline for project plan,
don’t forget to loop in teammates and stakeholders and
update details as the project gets underway.

By sharing the same central source of truth,
everyone on your team will have real-time insight into all of your team’s work.

adjust and adapt schedules as things change
Visualize dependencies between tasks, and
pinpoint dependency conflicts before they start

2. Kanban boards
a visual system for organizing a project where each task or actionable piece of work is represented by a card
– arrange in columns: represent
> the stages of a project/process
> the owner of the task,
> the priority of the work, or whatever

As each task or deliverable progresses, you move the card representing the task from column to column so
you can easily see where in the process the task is.

Kanban boards are great tools for
– Agile teams working in sprints
since they allow you to clearly see how work is progressing
– Bug tracking
– Sprint planning
– Sprint retrospectives
– Agile daily standup meetings
– Web production management
– Work requests
– Scrum boards

Example of a boards project
A bug tracking workflow
– you get a task for a new bug,
– ID’d and
– added to the backlog,
– worked on, and
– eventually, completed.

Columns
– New bugs (i.e. your backlog)
– Ready to be worked on
– In progress
– In QA
– Complete

3. Project calendars
a traditional calendar. It may be simple and straightforward, but it can also be ideal for planning certain projects.
– when need to manage lots of tasks with different due dates

– Knowing when you need to complete a milestone or deliver an asset in any given week, month, or year
> helps you plan ahead and

on a daily basis
– a Kanban board or even to-do list style view might be better for your team.

> create a list of tasks in a project,
> set due dates, and
> then switch to Calendar View to automatically see your tasks on the calendar.

reports or status updates
– much more effective to display the information in a visual format.
– see data in a visual way: can quickly digest and easily share with their own bosses and stakeholders