The Ultimate Guide To Enterprise Project Management

Udn Webber

Content Manager

Want to learn about enterprise project management (EPM)?

You’re probably here because your business has grown into a large organization with tons of complex projects that need to be managed simultaneously .

Lucky you! 💸

However, you’re also probably here because you need a little help handling enterprise projects.

Not to worry!

In this article, we’ll take a look at what enterprise project management is , the operations involved, and the best tool to help you manage all your high-level projects.

Ready, set, let’s go!

What Is Enterprise Project Management?

Enterprise project management is the practice of managing multiple projects on a company-wide scale, allowing you to have a 360 degree view of the organization’s collective efforts.

Large enterprise organizations have multiple complex projects that need to be started and completed simultaneously.

Sort of like the chocolate factory in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

You know, the one with all the candy machines working at the same time. 🍫

Unfortunately, complex projects don’t really seem connected most of the time.

But the truth is… they are!

Remember, each project affects the success of the enterprise .

So, how do you manage so many projects on a company-wide scale?

The answer lies in enterprise project management.

Enterprise project management aims to streamline your projects and processes.

With enterprise project management software , your project team can automate tedious tasks and have more time to focus on the important stuff (the chocolate).

What Are the 10 Keys to Enterprise Project Management?

Here are 10 project aspects that enterprise project management can help you with:

1.  Program Management

Program management involves managing projects that are different yet connected.

How?

They’re connected because all enterprise projects should contribute to the enterprise’s overall objective. And when you manage different individual projects collectively , they form a program.

For example, increasing your customer base or implementing a healthier chocolate recipe (to appeal to a new demographic) share the same goal so that they can be a part of the same program.

Here’s how enterprise project management can help your programs across their lifecycle:

This stage involves establishing the reason why you want to go ahead with the program.

It’s important to make sure that the program aligns with your company’s vision and objective.

Mind Maps are the perfect EPM solution for this stage. Our Mind Maps let you brainstorm every wild idea so you can use them to create successful business strategies.

An essential step in project planning is determining the scope of the program. This includes determining what resources are needed and who’ll be in the program team.

Check out our Gantt Charts for scheduling, managing dependencies , and prioritizing anything into an elegant project timeline .

With this dynamic timeline, you can keep up with project progress, manage deadlines, and handle bottlenecks.

Once the program has been completed, you need to analyze project deliverables and the program’s performance .

This can include assessments and reports that align with your metrics for project success. For example, Willy Wonka would look at sales indicators and customer data to see if his new recipe was a success.

Want to learn more about the different project phases? Check out this guide on the project management lifecycle .

2. Team collaboration

Team members need to combine ideas, expertise, and skills to pull off a successful enterprise project.

So how do they do it?

The answer lies in team collaboration .

With the added help of enterprise project management software, team collaboration helps teams develop solutions to roadblocks and move the project forward.

Luckily, UDN Task Manager is also a collaboration tool!

Here are some of UDN Task Manager ’s collaborative features:

Use Docs for real-time collaboration and editing over project and company documents.

You can even see when team members are viewing, typing, or commenting on the same Doc with our Collaboration Detection feature.

Hate feeling overwhelmed by comments? 😟

Well then, UDN Task Manager is your enterprise project management solution!

UDN Task Manager lets you Assign Comments to yourself and team members. This way, action items don’t get lost and are addressed immediately.

3. Time reporting

Time reporting helps every enterprise project manager visualize project progress and estimated completion times.

Without time reporting , project managers have no idea where projects are headed or if they’re going anywhere at all.

To avoid this, you need EPM software with built-in time-tracking features and powerful reports like the ones UDN Task Manager has.

The Global Timer lets employees track the time taken to complete their tasks.

You can Start and Stop tracking project time from anywhere, whether it’s the desktop, web app, or mobile app .

4. Financial management

Financial considerations are an integral component of any project plan. You need to make sure that you’ve budgeted for projects correctly and that your company can handle the expenses. It’s extremely important to recognize underfunded projects.

Here’s how the manager of your finance department would react if you ask them to fund a project that your company can’t afford:

Yikes.

But with an EPM system like UDN Task Manager , you can easily see your budget allocations, your actual spending, and your profits.

You can even perform powerful Calculations using your numerical data ($$$, Scrum points, etc.) in your tasks.

You can also use Recurring Tasks to get notified when payments are due. After you pay a monthly bill, just mark it as complete, and a new task is automatically created for the next month.

5. Resource management

Let’s go back to our chocolate factory scenario. Willy Wonka depends on his human resources, aka, his Oompa Loompas, for the success of his chocolate factory, right?

Each Oompa Loompa played a specific role and was responsible for a particular task.

Without them, his factory would melt to the ground, literally.

Similarly, you need to assess the availability of resources and how you’re going to allocate those resources before a project begins.

This includes your employees, money, time, and tools like IT equipment or office space.

Without accurate resource allocation , your projects can end up underfunded, understaffed, and delayed.

However, this would never happen with our Resource Management features.

UDN Task Manager has Multiple views , including a Workload view that shows a day-by-day visualization of how much each person has assigned to them during that period and compares it with their capacity.

This allows you to immediately see who is at full capacity and re-allocate tasks to those with unused capacity.

Looking for more ways to manage your resources efficiently? Check out this ultimate guide to resource management .

6. Schedule management

Scheduling works alongside resources.

Company resources are often scarce and have limited time availability.

And sometimes, those resources need to be shared amongst different people and projects. #SharingIsCaring

But to do this, your company needs to have an enterprise project management tool with built-in scheduling features.

Why not manage your resource schedule using UDN Task Manager ’s Calendar view ?

All you need to do is drag and drop tasks to set a schedule.

Or opt for our powerful calendar integrations .

You can send scheduled tasks directly to your favorite calendar app, including Apple Calendar, Outlook , and Google Calendar.

7. Demand management

Your enterprise needs to be able to handle external demands.

For example, Willy Wonka’s external demands could be children and families wanting more Golden Tickets on the market.

To handle external demands, you need to communicate with your clients and customers.

And instead of switching between your project management software and a CRM tool, like Salesforce, UDN Task Manager has built-in CRM functionalities .

How?

Combine Custom Fields with Kanban Boards and create unique task IDs to track budgets, organize client contact information, and so much more.

Use Form view to get inputs from clients and customers.

Once this is done, you can work on, assign, update, and move responses through a workflow, so that you can meet their demands.

8. Risk assessment and management

Managing a company isn’t easy. There are always things that can go wrong and affect the outcome of a project.

Risk management refers to putting processes in place so your company can prevent poorly performing projects from slipping through the cracks. Risk analysis is the process of identifying how much risk a project has that could negatively impact key initiatives.

Here are examples of processes that you can put in place to protect your business strategy and clients:

1. Your business strategy: To keep your strategy effective, you should update it consistently by setting strategic objectives and regularly reviewing your strategy against market conditions.

2. Your clients: Losing important clients can disrupt the entire workflow of your organization. To avoid this, you should prioritize your client’s work and provide value to them. And when your organization is juggling more tasks than there are Wonka Chocolate Bars, how do you ensure you don’t forget about a particular client’s task?

The answer lies in prioritization.

Why not simply use Priorities ?

With Priorities, your employees will know which tasks need to be completed before starting on the next one. Each priority flag indicates how important the task is.

And if you want to make the best use of your priorities, use Automations .

With it, UDN Task Manager can move a task to high priority automatically when the due date approaches (it’s among tons of other helpful things it can do automatically 😉).

9. Reporting and business intelligence

Project reports and intelligence are key elements in enterprise wide project management.

Why?

Because reports help enterprises monitor resource utilization, prevent risks, and build more efficient project plans. Effective reporting also allows project managers to make more informed decisions to keep a project on track.

With UDN Task Manager , you’ll get access to insightful Reports about your team. Here are just a few of them:

If you’re looking for an overview of your business operations instead, try out Dashboards !

With our Dashboards, you’ll have high-level views of everything going on in your Workspace and you can also monitor the progress of your workflow to keep your projects on track.

There are numerous types of Widgets you can add to your Dashboard:

That’s a whole lotta eye candy 😍

10. Project portfolio analytics and selection

Project portfolio management (PPM) is the step where an enterprise project manager evaluates the company’s project portfolio to see how efficient the company’s project processes are.

This could lead to the reallocation of resources or changes to some project steps.

For example, what did Willy Wonka do when he realized some kids weren’t the right fit for his chocolate factory?

He simply removed them from the process. 👋

If only project portfolio management was that easy.

Luckily, it can be with enterprise project management software like UDN Task Manager !

Use UDN Task Manager ’s Portfolios to get a high-level overview of what’s happening in your Workspace.

You can even organize and align company objectives from junior team members all the way to senior management.

Once that’s done, you can share any project portfolio with stakeholders and limit permissions when needed, so you feel safe, and they can stay informed.

What’s the Difference Between EPMO and PMO?

First we have to find out the mindset differences working in an enterprise project management versus traditional project management environment.

Paul C. Dinsmore from the Project Management Institute puts it succinctly :

Whereas traditional project management is aimed at answering “How can we get this project done effectively and efficiently?” enterprise project management poses the question, “How can we make this business more adaptive, responsive, and thus more profitable in a rapidly changing, multiproject environment?”

These two ways of thinking translate into different responsibilities and roles. Companies can be successfully organized under traditional project management office (PMO) or the enterprise project management office (EPMO).

Project managers in a PMO ensure standards and set the direction of project processes across the organization. They are often a separate department that does not assume a lead role in company strategic goals.

Project managers operating in EPMO are not only in charge of the company’s project portfolio, but also maintain a key high-level goal – to align all projects with company-wide objectives.

What Are The Benefits Of Enterprise Project Management?

You now know what goes into enterprise project management. But why do you need it?

1. Aligns business objectives

Enterprise project management improves the strategic alignment between business objectives and every enterprise project.

It also ensures that the projects initiated across the departments of an organization are aligned to your short and long-term business objectives.

This way, project managers know that they’re spending money on the right things:

2. Improves productivity and teamwork

Enterprise project management also enhances project coordination by outlining your goals and by using organizational objectives as a guideline.

Because cross-functional teams are aware of their goals, they can coordinate and can communicate efficiently. This ensures that everyone can collaborate smoothly and be at their productive best in your organization.

3. More projects are delivered on time

Improved communication systems also mean that there’s better risk mitigation, and if your team faces a challenge, there are risk resolution systems in place.

And since project coordination is maximized, more projects are delivered on time and within budget.

This also helps your new and innovative products and projects reach the market faster and before your competitors.

Implementing EPM Across Your Organization

Enterprise project managers should follow these three priorities when guiding an organization’s EPM implementation.

Practice a consistent methodology

A successful implementation approach requires everyone managing projects to speak the same language.

Project teams coordinated through a single project management approach will lay a solid foundation for your EPM model.

Whether you choose agile, lean, or PRINCE 2 approaches, it’s important to train your staff to be well versed in the project management methodology.

Implement a Project Support Office (PSO)

The Project Support Office is vital in rolling out EPM processes across the organization. According to the Project Management Institute, the PSO contributes by:

Choose the right EPM tools

Enterprise project managers need to evaluate enterprise project management software as these tools will greatly impact the organization.

Integrations are important especially if you’re looking to retain existing workflows.

Additionally, ensure that the enterprise project management software can support your organization through such changes.

UDN Task Manager offers 1000+ integrations as well as robust enterprise project management software features. Additionally, UDN Task Manager ’s Enterprise Plans allow you access to our professional services and client success managers to support you during enterprise rollout.

Wrapping Up 🍫

Enterprise project management helps project managers and teams manage several different projects on a company-wide scale.

Because enterprise project management focuses on grouping multiple projects together, teams have a broader view of company activities.

But to manage any enterprise project efficiently, you need enterprise project management software like UDN Task Manager .

From helping you with program management to giving you innovative project templates , UDN Task Manager is your Golden Ticket to effective enterprise project management.

And by combining innovative project management methodologies like Agile and Scrum , UDN Task Manager is the ultimate project management solution.

So, why haven’t you hopped on the train yet?

Get UDN Task Manager for free today to get your ticket to perfect enterprise project management!