If you ask a project manager about their worst nightmares, they would probably name missed deadlines and unpredicted expenses. Without a sense of deadline and budget, a project may end up falling into the cracks.
Project tracking is an essential component of project management. It keeps projects on track by monitoring the goals, tasks, and milestones involved. The good part– you don’t need to track it on your own.
Project tracking tools like Meegle provide real-time visibility into tasks and project milestones through visual workflows and automated updates. In this article, we’ll discuss project tracking, its importance, its benefits, and how project management tools like Meegle help with it.
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What is Project Tracking?
Project tracking is a project management method that helps teams track their progress throughout the project lifecycle.
Project managers can compare the actual progress with the planned progress and spot any potential issues that prevent projects from staying on budget.
Project tracking helps track the goals and milestones, along with tracking:
- What work has been done correctly?
- What resources are used to execute those tasks?
- Is the project heading toward the right goals and objectives?
The nature of project tracking depends largely on the scope of the project.
For instance, managers might use techniques such as Gantt charts to track certain key performance indicators, and they may prefer regular communication to keep on track.
What is a Project Tracker?
A project tracker is a tool for monitoring progress as teams execute tasks and utilize resources. It can be created on a spreadsheet, a whiteboard, or used as a template.
However, the best project tracker tools centralize information into a single dashboard, facilitate communication, and give a real-time update on the tasks. It also integrates your project information with other tools that you’re using on the project.
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Why is Project Tracking critical?
Project tracking is a critical part of the project management process. Project managers can seamlessly track task due dates, see which resources are correctly used, and keep a check on budget.
An efficient project tracker serves essential purposes for the teams:
- Provides visibility into task progress: Features such as real-time updates give teams visibility into their task progress and the time it will take to complete a task.
- Tracks deadlines: Project tracking ensures that the project team remains aware of impending deadlines and can plan their tasks accordingly. Project managers can compare task progress with deadlines to assess whether the team is achieving the set goals in the adhered timeline.
- Resource allocation: Project trackers provide real-time updates on resource allocation. It identifies the areas where adjustments are needed in order to avoid bottlenecks and avoid budget overruns.
- Monitors individual tasks: Along with the team's task tracking, it is also important to examine individual goals and timelines. Project trackers allow project managers to track individual task progress and ensure that no task is falling behind schedule.
- Enhances communication: Project tracking facilitates communication between the stakeholders and team members throughout the project lifecycle. This creates a collaborative environment and keeps everyone on the same page with insights into updates, challenges, and solutions.
How to Track Project Progress?
Tracking multiple projects with a few clicks may seem like a daunting task, but the right process and planning can set you up for success.
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Follow these steps to start with project tracking:
Define clear objectives
The first step in tracking project progress is to define clear, measurable objectives. Before setting up the project tracker, use the SMART goal-setting technique to ensure clarity on project goals, and focus on project deliverables. This means setting up project objectives that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.
Create a project plan
Project planning sets the base for efficient project management. It provides a roadmap for projects, outlining the project scope, goals, timeline, tasks, and resources.
Project teams can stay informed about individuals' roles and responsibilities so that they are held accountable for their tasks.
Also, project plans enable project managers to jot down milestones, track timelines, and allocate resources accordingly.
Establish a communication plan for each project
A communication plan is an outline of how the team members will communicate throughout the project lifecycle. It also lays down the most important communication channels and who will use those channels.
For instance, a communication plan will define the various channels that a team will use – email,messaging and in-person meetings.
Most importantly, a communication plan also includes details about when a manager needs to communicate for tracking purposes.
Create a project tracker
A project tracker can be a handy template or a visual dashboard that centralizes every project detail into a single source of information. Templates such as Excel or spreadsheets require manual intervention to add information and monitor the tasks in real time.
A project tracker tool is an efficient substitute for templates since it provides real-time access to data. It consists of all the ingredients for tracking, including project scheduling, project timeline, task management, and budget and resource management.
Update your project tracker
Consistently updating your project tracker makes it the single source of truth for your project. For this, real-time tracking is a must-have feature in your project tracking tool.
Review the project progress
Setting up the project tracker isn’t the end of the process. Project managers should regularly review progress to keep stakeholders informed about issues.
Reviews can happen in meetings with the team or stakeholders, wherein you discuss the project's current status, address concerns, and make necessary decisions.
A good idea is to create a scheduled report that offers real-time updates on tasks and surface-level insights into the project.
What Are the Challenges with Traditional Project Tracking?
Using a spreadsheet for tracking your projects may sound appealing because of its ease of learning, but it may pose various challenges as the project progresses:
Inefficient documentation
One of the major drawbacks of traditional project tracking is its inefficiency in managing documents in a single place. Here, the documents are scattered across various platforms and sources, leading to confusion and inefficient tracking.
Moreover, a document or a folder may be incompatible with the current version of the spreadsheet, increasing the risk of errors.
Lack of real-time visibility
Manually updating task status, timelines, and resources can be daunting for managers and may lead to delays or missed deadlines. Without real-time tracking, team leaders may not be aware of tasks and deadlines falling behind the schedule.
Increased administrative burden due to lack of workflows
Traditional project trackers like spreadsheets lack automation and streamlined workflows. Without automation, project managers may be burdened with heavy workloads by spending a significant amount of time on administrative tasks such as entering data, managing timelines, and sorting documents.
Inconsistent reporting
Inadequate data and a lack of resources may lead to erratic reporting. Moreover, variations in reporting formats or intervals can result in inconsistency in reports.
Project managers may find it challenging to sort out the data, select the right metrics, and present information that is easily understandable.
A standardized reporting system is crucial for maintaining clarity and ensuring that everyone is on the same page.
Limited collaboration
Traditional project trackers may fail to establish seamless communication between team members and stakeholders. For example, a spreadsheet or a template lacks the communication platform, and task updates may either happen in delayed or overly frequent team meetings.
Hence, it becomes challenging to share documents, regular updates, and frequent feedback, which is essential for successful project delivery.
Benefits of Project Tracker Software
Project tracker software offers immense benefits for team members and project managers. Be it for optimizing the workflows or using it to stay on track, project management tools can be a game changer:
Efficiently manage data
Data is at the heart of project management. It provides a starting point for every project phase—initiation, execution, and tracking.
Project trackers centralize data from various sources, ensuring that project managers have access to real-time and updated information. This centralized data can be used to create optimized workflows, project timelines, and deliverable tracking. Thus, project managers can make informed decisions and eliminate guesswork.
Use different views to track project progress
Project management software offers a detailed view of the project scope and milestones. Different users have different preferences in how they want to view their data.
Project tracking software caters to the needs of every individual by offering different views, including Tree view, Gantt chart, Kanban boards, and table structure.
Help build strong communication
With access to real-time data and up-to-date information, project managers can monitor each individual’s tasks.
Project tracking software offers seamless communication between team members, facilitating quick task updates, document management, feedback, and review meetings.
This synchronization enables the agile project teams to act quickly on tasks and handle challenges as they arise. Moreover, these tools also offer integration with various third-party tools, such as in-messaging apps and productivity tools like Slack.
So, if a team is already using the existing tool, they won’t need to switch to another one for communication.
Automate manual tasks
Project tracking software uses automation capabilities to automate various mundane tasks such as entering the data, creating a report, scheduling a meeting, or asking for updates. Project managers can create automated workflows to trigger an action when a specific task is completed.
Best Practices in Project Tracking
While having the right project tracker software helps with efficient project tracking, certain best practices can further enhance the process. Let's elaborate on how each of these practices can benefit project tracking.
Establish regular communication
Regular communication forms the backbone of effective project tracking. Sharing progress reports, addressing weak areas, or discussing deadline adjustments keeps everyone in the loop.
Furthermore, daily stand-up meetings, weekly team reviews, monthly stakeholder meetings, and regular communication help identify potential roadblocks.
Maintain consistency
Create a standard method for tracking the project data. There should be consistency in tracking methods, reporting formats, communication styles, and meeting schedules so that project team members aren't left behind.
Set prior targets
Targets work as a reference point for tracking projects. With clearly defined targets, team members get a starting point and an ending point for the assigned tasks. Most importantly, measuring these targets gives a clear picture of the tasks. Using certain key metrics to track these targets can help identify whether the project is on track.
How to use Meegle for Project Tracking
Meegle simplifies project tracking with essential features that provide clear visibility, efficient scheduling, and optimized resource management. Here’s how Meegle’s features can enhance your project tracking:
Tree View for Project Structure
Meegle’s Tree View organizes projects into a multi-level structure, helping you break down goals into manageable tasks while maintaining a global perspective. This view is perfect for tracking both the big picture and individual task details.
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Fuel progress with the big picture of all the projects with Meegle's Tree View
Schedule Management Mode
Once your schedule is established and the project is underway, it’s vital to stay informed without interfering with your team’s workflow. One of Meegle’s most helpful features is the schedule management mode of the Tree View, which allows you to view the entire project schedule as a single view with a Gantt chart.
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Visualize your project with Schedule Management mode on the tree view
You can gain a high-level view of the project using this view, which gives you all the key project data on time, status, workload and more. The information is presented in colorful and easy-to-read charts, making it simple to digest.
Taskboard for Real-Time Tracking
Meegle’s Taskboard offers a quick way to track task progress in real-time, showing what’s completed, pending, or at risk. It provides instant insights and helps with prioritizing tasks, setting deadlines, and managing workloads—all from a user-friendly interface.
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Track the status of your project tasks using Meegle’s Taskboard
Automated Reporting and Notifications
Meegle tracks project data on dashboards and automatically sends notifications to keep stakeholders informed without extra effort from the project manager. Scheduled updates provide a consistent view of progress, challenges, and key milestones.
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Set up automated notifications for custom triggers with Meegle
Meegle also has out-of-the-box reporting templates with a high level of customization and flexibility. Pie, line, and bar graphs, as well as many other visualization options.
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Harness instant data insights to gain a competitive edge, optimize operations, and capitalize on emerging opportunities
Work Smarter, Not Harder, With Meegle’s Project Tracking Software
Keeping projects on track can be challenging, but Meegle makes it easier with powerful tracking tools. With features like real-time task updates, visual workflows, and automated reporting, you’ll gain unmatched visibility and control over your project progress.
Sign up for a free trial and see how Meegle can streamline your project tracking and elevate your management experience!
