Companies large and small, teams, personalities, start-ups, and freelancers, are now transitioned to distributed work. Some of them are trying to get back to the office, and others are searching for a hybrid balance. On a human level, project managers are trying to establish the best methods of communicating while people managers struggle to engage team members in collaborative relationships.
If you have a company larger than 3, you are already experiencing some of these issues. With people comes the responsibility of being mindful of locations, schedules, personalities, and even proper wording. Having a diverse team of individuals means having various ways of handling information, administering tasks, and running an optimal work-life balance.
At the upcoming PM72 Summit, the panel of experts will be talking about all things project management. You’ll not want to miss it. But let’s dig a bit deeper…
So, how to create a collaboration flow that your team actually likes?
Among the common causes of dysfunctional project management are excessive company growth, overcomplicated workflows, too many tools and a lack of communication between team members. If you are a victim of a recent acquisition (not pointing a finger at anyone), you are probably obliged to enrol in the tools your new company uses. Imagine jumping from Trello to Hive in a few days?
Most project management platforms are feature-heavy and complex and require time and training even to lay the foundations. And most project managers make the same simple mistake when adopting a new tool (or a new team): they start from the perspective of the tool, rather than the team.
Me
“PM tools 101: If your dev team likes the tooling, it’s too ugly for the marketing team.”
I am passionate about broken workflows, poor communication, and a lack of proper teamwork strategy. We can’t let our team be slow and unproductive in a world driven by automation, process, and logic. And being slow and unproductive often equals being miserable.
The PM72 Summit gathers people worldwide who share the same passion and ambition for a better process, optimised workflow, and happy teams.
The event’s goal is not just to share project management knowledge but to support the Malala Fund and help bolster girls’ rights to shape their future.
The 72-hour virtual stage is open to expert speakers in the project management space – from managing risk, change, and operations to teamwork and team performance. More than 51 speakers are ready to share their biggest wins and fails and their greatest advice on managing your company and team without sacrificing your well-being.
Project management for business teams in Jira and Confluence is not an impossible dream
Business and marketing teams tend to immediately disregard tooling used by their engineering teams. It’s a common mistake to think that such tools are unsuitable or too complex for non-technical teams. As mentioned in my previous article, Atlassian tooling for the marketing teams is a Schrodinger’s situation. Teams are adopting and divorcing it simultaneously, pretending to play the “agile” game mainly because it’s a trendy term instead of going deeper into the actual process.
Controversially, the agile methodology of project management is built to act on changes. So why are teams who are thriving on change struggling to find the right fit?
Shortest answer: they overcomplicate it.
Let’s plug a few science-based facts here. Do you know that:
- The uninterrupted time needed for real focus work is 1 to 2 hours.
- On average, 30% of our workday is spent in status meetings (weekly updates, staff meetings, project updates).
- The total amount of real productive time on an average 8-hour workday is 2 hours 23 minutes.
This translates to:
- If your process is too complex, your team will spend more time figuring out how to work than actually working.
- If your process is built around too many live discussions, status meetings, and team calls, you can lose almost the entire productive capacity of your employees.
- Actively collaborating across tools rather than in person can give you back 30% of your workday. Use it to improve your well-being by taking a walk outside or making yourself a nice cup of tea.
We are lucky to be part of the Atlassian ecosystem. With millions of users and customers worldwide, they’ve established a brand new way to collaborate and work. It’s a long road since Jira was only an engineering tool, and Confluence just a wiki.
With Jira Software, Jira Work Management, and even Jira Service Management, you can set up a well-balanced workflow, from planning to assignment and tracking.
Using Confluence’s best practices and templates and fully utilizing the app’s capabilities will provide your team with the most precious asset: information. Without a single Zoom call.
Why join a PM session that lasts… less than 15 minutes?
To record this session, I didn’t just step outside of my comfort zone. I travelled to the next planet on from my comfort zone. Still, I am thankful for having the opportunity to challenge myself.
Creating a nice, working project management environment is painful. I’ve been trying a million different ways, making impossible connections between tools, getting continuous feedback from the team, setting up Confluence and Jira instances from scratch and failing miserably 50% of the time.
In this session, I’m not giving you the remedy to instantly cure your process. I’m sharing with you my steps and staples for improving team and project efficiency without losing your mind.
Add my session to your calendar: Join PM72 Summit | Free Online Project Management Event
Don’t forget to check all other sessions. Watch, learn and share feedback 
And remember: simplicity is key.
See you at PM72, and thank you for supporting the Malala Fund!
Teodora Vasileva is a Confluence junkie, using it to manage both work and life. She loves hiking in the mountains of Bulgaria and dreams of waking up and finding a Welsh Corgi puppy on her bed seeking cuddles. She tumbled into software and the Atlassian ecosystem after getting recruited by Botron, an Atlassian Marketplace Vendor, eventually becoming a one-woman army for all of Botron’s marketing, events, and partnerships.