Project Management and Creative Teams

There is new, New York Times article you should get into. I “Digg” ed it at: http://digg.com/software/Innovative_Minds_Do_Not_Think_Alike
From the article: “Look for people with renaissance-thinker tendencies, who’ve done work in a related area but not in your specific field,” she says. “Make it possible for someone who doesn’t report directly to that area to come in and say the emperor has no clothes.” Yes but how do you herd a team of these stray cats? I manage a Web.20 PR firm – where we actively engage these types. It’s painful at times but we land up doing great work. I rely on an industrial grade project management tool called Vertabase that is tuned for the vicissitudes of creative team work. A skilled creative project manager can get excellence by automating team work processes using this type of tool even though her or she might be a “know-it-all”

Please also take a look at this link back to the Vertabase Blog: http://www.vertabase.com/blog/project-management-software-for-marketing-companies-and-ad-agencies/ . Here is a summary of the relevant tips from that post:- Managing workflow on marketing projects can lead to greater profitability for a marketing company or ad agency.- By having a clear picture of everyone’s work allocation and easily sharing and communicating tasks on projects you can start to get an accurate handle on the workload.- By mapping those tasks across a project schedule, then getting a total company view across all project schedules, you can get a complete picture of your current and future workflow.- You can make strategic decisions and plan accordingly to use your resources more effectively -and be more profitable.

I think the leap here is that good project management software can promote creativity and remove some chaos!

Thoughts?