How to Communicate on Projects

As a Team Member 

It's easy to get sucked into email, meetings and discussions that consume your day and prevent you from getting tasks done. So try these tips to help free your time so you can focus on tasks:

Email: Ask your colleagues to only email you when something needs to be done, or if it's important. You need to reduce the email you receive each day to free time for completing tasks. "Noise" (through too much email) makes communication less effective. So keep email to a minimum.

Meetings: Only schedule meetings if you can't resolve something in a brief discussion. Then only involve people in the meeting that absolutely have to attend. Plan each meeting by writing the agenda and key objectives beforehand, so it's focused. Keep your meetings short and to the point.

Also, always take minutes recording the decisions made. Send those minutes to those people that will be affected by your decisions and then store the minutes in your project folder.

Discussions: Minimize the number of discussions with colleagues during the day. Don't involve others unless you have to. Try and plan your discussions by using a tool like Skype to see if people are available first, as interrupting them by phone or in person will break their workflow.

By minimizing email, meetings and discussions and keeping them focused and short, you're avoiding all of the usual "noise" that project teams usually generate. You'll not only boost your productivity, but you'll communicate much more effectively.

As a Manager

 Reports: Generate project reports once a week to see if your project is on track. Then distribute those reports to your customer and management team. Explain any deviations from the plan and what you're doing to correct them.

 Team Meetings: Hold a weekly meeting with your team, even if it's only 30 minutes. Communicate the status of the project. Tell them your goals, deliverables and timeframes that need to be achieved. Get everyones buy-in. Everyone must be on the same page and fully motivated, if you're to meet your targets.

 Tools: Collaborate with your team online, using a software tool like ProjectManager.com. That way you can reduce email by holding focused discussions, sharing files and sending messages online, all in one place.