How to choose a project management software?

Quite often in a project-oriented organization, the manager faces the question of choosing software in the field of project management. It is very important that the selected software meets the requirements of the project team and provides full and high-quality support and increased efficiency of project management processes in the company.

As a rule, the most important requirements that are considered when choosing a system are:

User Interface
Data Management
Planning mechanism
Enable collaboration

If all these requirements meet our needs, then this software product (PP) can be effectively used as an element of the project management information system. Let's consider each requirement separately:

1. User interface.

The first thing that the user pays attention to when working with the program is the user interface.

When choosing a software interface, you can note those features that help you enter and view information:

Flexibility in the organization of screen forms
Availability of the help system
Ease of editing tools
Availability of wizards and templates

The user interface can be considered from the point of view of ease of development by a software tool and evaluated by the following parameters:

Easy to learn
Ease of use
Presence of a system of macros (formulas)
Flexible contextual search system
Tutorials

2. Data Management

With the improvement of software, developers began to place greater emphasis on facilitating the process of entering information and navigating the software product.

Data management should provide advanced capabilities for accessing and transmitting information, grouping, combining, administering and adapting project data.

Access and transfer of data

When using multi-project management in the organization and management of the project portfolio, the amount of information increases significantly. There is a need to access data from different sources. For example, when using different applications and systems (ERP, etc.), you may need to combine this data with project information.

Differentiation of access to information about projects is also a prerequisite for data storage. Complex ICs should use an industrial DBMS to provide users with fast and reliable access to data.
In cases where data is stored in multiple locations or in multiple databases, it may seem necessary to use distributed storage and replication tools.

Grouping information

Depending on the role in the project team, project members need access to a variety of information. Shared databases often support a mode of operation where more information is available to a single user than they can use per unit of time. For optimal and efficient operation, it is important to build a reliable data manipulation system to enable the user to group information according to their knowledge and experience.

To obtain various types of analytical reports in large-scale data storage systems, the use of OLAP (On-Line Analytical Processing) mechanisms is effective. In OLAP systems, information is organized into groups of a certain format to increase the speed of access to the necessary data.
Administration and adaptation

Individual users do not have to run OLAP analysis procedures themselves or form queries when working with data. The software should include an administrative system that would contribute to the formation of the data system, including the function of centralized data updating and security of their storage.

The administrator should identify the information needs of individual users and organize the output of data, the formation of queries, the compilation of spreadsheets, templates of views and reports in accordance with their requirements.

The data should be presented as user-defined time phased segments organized into system hierarchies. A graphical representation of the data is very convenient.

Combine (sum) data

Many PP allow you to combine data on various grounds. This function is supported by a variety of fields (text, numeric data, fields for recording dates, etc.) The data in these fields can be sorted, filtered, grouped. The ability to combine data is the most valuable for increasing the speed of working with data and reporting.

3. Planning methods.

There are a number of requirements in the planning process where inaccuracies and non-compliance with all planning conditions can lead to inefficient operation of the project management application.

The list of the main features of the systems in the implementation of planning:

Create a project workspace
Description of WBS structure
Description of different work calendars
Input and storage of data by resources
Describe timelines and work estimates, resource allocation schedules, and costing
Enter and store important project dates and milestones
Scheduling the project
Resource planning
Calculation of project budgets
Calculation of time spent on work (time schedules)
Collection of information on the status of works and revision of calendar plans
Enter actual costs

Calculation of the cost of work

Additionally, many users may be willing to use the following features in the product itself or in applications:

Identify risk areas
Calculation of risk indicators
Calculate risk mitigation capabilities
Critical Risk Chain Planning
Change the control action

For the optimal choice of software, it is necessary to think about the question of what data should be entered, calculated or displayed using these features? Can the tool you're considering handle this data while meeting business requirements?

In addition, it is necessary to assess whether the software algorithms have sufficient capabilities to correctly and effectively draw up calendar plans? Can you repeat the calculation and get the right result? Can you not go beyond certain limitations? Does the capacity planning schedule match the work schedule? Is it correct to calculate the cost of the project taking into account the scope of work? These issues are very significant.

On the one hand, almost all popular products use the traditional critical path method and a sequential resource allocation algorithm. However, each manufacturer has developed its own capabilities for these two main calculation models, which can serve as a profitable addition to the main features or, conversely, worsen the software product.

On the one hand, almost all popular products use the traditional critical path method and a sequential resource allocation algorithm. However, each manufacturer has developed its own capabilities for these two main calculation models, which can serve as a profitable addition to the main features or, conversely, worsen the software product.