NewYork2008:Whirlwind Discussion of Project Management Utilities

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This fast-paced session will allow participants to share the various project management utilities available, including time tracking, task management, source code control, and more.



TOOLS

INTRODUCTION

4 General Task Areas

  • Database/CRM
  • Communication
  • Large Scale Planning Tools
  • Types of wikis

COMMUNICATION

  • Chatting: Skype, Trillian, Gaim, AIM, Skype, gchat
  • Desktop Sharing: WebX, Yugma, Copilot, VNC
  • Voice: Skype, Vonage, VOIPCheap (free calls)
    • Wikis--communication among members asynchronously
 When do wikis not work?  What happens with team members when they don't work?
  • Project Management Software: Basecamp, Central Desktop, @Task, SharePoint

Project Management Tools:

  • GANTT Charts - a lot of people use MS Project but are afraid to admit it. It does provide a way of planning a project in detail, communicating the project plan and progress to clients and colleagues and then day-to-day management of the project.

"Given that there are so many project management tools, why do we still use Excel?"

  • It's flat and easy. "It's basically a piece of paper that does math."

Presentation Software: Camtasia, "Why do people switch over to GoogleDocs from Word vs. switching from PowerPoint to the Google equivalent?" EEE laptop and presentations

WIDGETS (ie CoolLittleThings)

  • www.doodle.ch--scheduling meetings with people from external organizations software--free
  • Meeting Wizard
  • FoxMarks--synchronizes bookmarks on different computers on Firefox
  • SurveyMonkey, Zoomerang--Technology Assessment
  • GoogleApps
  • The Nonprofit Soapbox


The importance of tying it all together. Overhead elimination.

You can hook up Basecamp to SugarCRM.

AHA

  • SpongeBob Squarepants
  • Tools are great but they're heavy in overhead. Everyone should realize that tools take effort and that there is a cost to adding tools.
  • Tools are no good if nobody uses them.


GoogleDocs just added some features

Google Docs gets better

  • You can never be too organized. Now, with the addition of nested folders,

it's even easier to keep track of your important documents. Check out the details at: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2008/01/sub-sub-folders.html

  • Thanks to a recent update, you can now print documents with headers and

footers. Read more: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2008/01/headers-and-footers.html

  • Checked out presentations lately? If not, you may be missing a slew of

new features: you can drag and drop images into slides, easily import slides from other presentations, embed a slideshow in a webpage, and more. Here's a round-up of updates: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2008/01/new-features-for-2008.html

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