The most often highly mistaken strategy in management is the art of prioritizing your tasks.  Often misinterpreted as a trivial aspect, this is one tricky thing that plays a vital part in the outcome of any task that you take up.  Whenever a project is kick started, the most daunting task any Project Manager will face is to imbibe this culture of prioritizing tasks among the teammates.  In my fitness marketing business, I find that it is not just the tasks at the level of a project that needs to be prioritized.  It should be a way of life even among every team member.  The Project Manager and other senior members could be quite systematic with a planned approach.  However, it should be noted that project outcomes are highly dependant on the quality of every team member of the project.  It could be a senior most Analyst, or it could be a project trainee.  It is ultimately every member’s approach that decides the success or failure of a project.  To analyze prioritization, management experts feel that the whole aspect could be made to look quite simple.
During contingency situations, there may be numerous tasks confronting Managers that they would wish to complete within a short span of time.  The challenge that lies ahead is to make sure that all the jobs that would take forward the business ahead be performed without fail, within the time period allocated to them.  It is these tasks that are of utmost priority and the lesser ones could be sequenced relatively.  The art of Management preaches categorization of such tasks into 3 categories.  It is the Category A, B and C method that is generally popular among management experts.  The most important vital tasks ahead are categorized as Category-A tasks.  These are tasks that are so significant that without their completion, the business cannot be taken forward.  It is only these tasks that deserve direct intervention from the owner or the person responsible.  The rest of the tasks can be sequenced as the next Category B tasks.  The Category B tasks are the ones that are definitely significant.  However, they may be the routine operational tasks that are part and parcel of any routine business operation.  The Category B tasks can be outsourced to a core-competent expert or to an assistant.  The main idea of the Category B tasks is to ease down on the efforts to be taken by the sole owner or the person responsible for completion of the tasks.  The division of labor thus significantly speeds up the entire gamut of collection of tasks ahead that need to be completed within the stipulated and significantly less amount of time.  The next in line are the Category C tasks.  These are tasks that the executive or Project Manager might have thought of to be adding a bit more of extra value to the project.  The Category C tasks do not form a part and parcel of the project outcome / output.  However these tasks may add a certain bit more value to the project that may increase the customer delight.  It is not necessary that the tasks categorized under this category have to be completed, for successful completion of the project.  They just can be thought of as a value addition and nothing else.  Hence, these tasks can be done away with if any contingency situation arises with respect to shortage of time or manpower etc.

Again, while outsourcing, a Project Manager needs to necessarily keep in mind that the person to whom the task is being outsourced, need not put in their heart and soul into the task.  Hence the output that you get out of outsourced tasks may be just close to 80% - 85% of the quality you would have expected.  This is a tradeoff to saving time and man hours and something I try to keep this in mind when outlinging projects for fitness business strategies.

Tags: rioritization, strategy, team, project, management, management, competition, stress, tasks, priorit | rioritization, strategy, team, project, management, management, competition, stress, tasks, priorit

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