Project Management Checklist

What is a project management checklist?

A project management checklist is a document used by project teams to create a framework by standardizing processes in project management. It is an essential tool for busy project managers to keep their team on track for success.

In general, a project management checklist is a sheet of placeholders that helps document various project activities, such as:

• Project planning
• Goal setting
• Work plan creation
• Cost management
• Task assignment
• Project status tracking

This article discusses the following topics:

1. Why you need a project management checklist

2. The 5 benefits of project management checklists

3. A digital tool for project management

Why you need a project management checklist

Checklists can make your work on projects, especially recurring projects that are similar, a lot easier. If you create a project outline manually, you’ll have the hassle of creating a new outline again every time you start a new project. Working time that you could also use well for your actual project tasks.

When you start a project, there’s a lot to do. You need to create a project proposal, define your project scope, create a work breakdown structure, and more. However, if you have a set of project management checklists, you can quickly enter your project data and get started right away. That way, you won’t have to waste time setting everything up from scratch each time.

As mentioned in the beginning, a project management checklist is a data set with placeholders for the project scope, work plans, costs, and so on. Since all this information is immediately available to you after data entry, you can focus on important other project tasks and start diagnosing problems during the project right away and intervene early. Project management checklists help you avoid project traps, such as poor project planning, weak resource management, and ineffective communication, that cause numerous projects to fail.

The 5 benefits of a project management checklist

Use the following 5 benefits of project management checklists to ensure the success of your next project:

1. Improve communication at all levels
   Poor communication is one of the main reasons projects fail. With a project management checklist, you can consider all of a project’s communication needs and plan a communication strategy that promotes collaboration among all levels of the project team.
2. Allocate resources properly
   Poor resource allocation is cited as the second leading cause of project failure. With an appropriate project management checklist (such as a project charter), it’s easier for you to ensure a consistent process that the right resources are identified and allocated before a project is started.
3. Save time by hitting milestones on time
   Project setup is time-consuming, especially if you have to keep creating plan templates for each new endeavor. Having an appropriate project management checklist will go a long way toward improving efficiency from the start by eliminating the need to think so much about what should and shouldn’t be included in the template
4. Reduce risk
   All projects involve risk (e.g., schedule conflicts, emergencies, random events, delays, and customer revisions). A project risk assessment identifies and manages these to minimize their negative impact on the project. For example, a project management checklist can help you immediately see and assess an identified risk and assign it to a responsible employee who will have to take responsibility for it.
5. Improve documentation of processes
   By using project management checklists, you emphasize the importance of documenting and archiving processes. The backed-up data can help you with the success of current and future projects. Through the checklist, you can access and reference relevant information to make your project a success.

Use Lumiform for efficient project management

Paper-based project management checklists not only take up a lot of space but are also susceptible to damage and loss. Moreover, they can be easily viewed by unauthorized people. With Lumiform, you can create a project management checklist, customize it, and share it with the rest of the project team – all with just a few taps of your finger. What’s more, with Lumiform as your project management software, you and your project team can:

• Download expert-reviewed templates from Lumiform’s template library and start using them immediately, or convert your paper template to Lumiform’s digital format.
• Access your project management checklist anytime, anywhere via the app by smartphone or tablet to update data online or offline.
• Insert photos and comments into your project management checklist.
• Monitor project performance and progress in real time. The analytics feature turns completed forms and checklists into valuable data that you and your team can use to improve project processes.
• Automatically generate project management reports and share them digitally with key stakeholders to enable efficient communication for decision making.
• Store reports and documents centrally in cloud storage for secure data retention and easy access.