Blog

11 Ways to Build the Strengths of Your Team Members

May 16, 2019 | Team LiquidPlanner

To lead a top-performing team, you need to do more than direct and delegate work. Truly effective managers can recognize the unique strengths of each team member and optimize all those natural gifts. If you’re in a leadership position, this might sound like a daunting task, but it’s not. The first step is to identify...

Three Must-Reads to Build Better Teams

May 14, 2019 | Andy Makar

Building high-performing teams isn’t easy, even though teamwork and project management go hand in hand. As teams form, they all go through Bruce Tuckman’s four stages of team development, which is characterized by formal introductions and pleasantries, recognizing conflicting opinions, establishing common ground, and eventually working better as a team. Tuckman formally defines these stages...

How Serenity, Courage, and Wisdom Can Help You through Workplace Struggles

May 9, 2019 | Andy Silber

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, And wisdom to know the difference. The Serenity Prayer is familiar to anyone who’s been through a 12-step program like Alcoholics Anonymous. I don’t know if it helps with addiction, but I do know it helps me...

Ask a PM: How to Recover a Project That Is Struggling in Execution

April 30, 2019 | Elizabeth Harrin

Dear Elizabeth: I’ve been brought into a project part-way through. The project is struggling, and my manager is expecting me to get it back on track. Are there specific tools I should be using to make it easier to pick up a project that is already in the Execution phase? How can I start to...

From Onboarding to Expert: Refining and Optimizing the LiquidPlanner Experience

April 25, 2019 | Team LiquidPlanner

Previously, we discussed the onboarding and adoption stages that companies go through when they integrate LiquidPlanner into their daily workflow. This week, we’ll be covering the third and final stages: refining and optimization. Refining The refining stage tends to kick in once you’ve been using LiquidPlanner long enough to focus on proactively managing project risk....

Five Steps to Getting a Project Done

April 23, 2019 | Team LiquidPlanner

You’re eager to start a new project and jump right in without trying to make order out of and find meaning in everything that needs to get done. How much time do you spend scratching your head, wondering what to do next or even how or where to start? Having a good plan is the most...

From Onboarding to Expert: Adopting LiquidPlanner Practices

April 18, 2019 | Team LiquidPlanner

In our last article, we quickly discussed the four key phases LiquidPlanner customers experience when they first begin using the product: onboarding, adoption, refining, and optimization. Then, we detailed the onboarding phase. Today, we’ll focus on adoption and how to gain insights into your team’s usage of LiquidPlanner. Adoption After onboarding, we move into adoption....

Why You Shouldn’t Be a Jerk

April 16, 2019 | Andy Silber

The other night I was watching the pilot of Workin’ Moms, a Canadian sitcom about women who have just returned to work after maternity leave. One of the moms pulls a really jerky move on her first day back, making it seem that her executive assistant had screwed up. By the end of the episode,...

From Onboarding to Expert: Optimizing Projects and Processes with LiquidPlanner

April 11, 2019 | Team LiquidPlanner

Here at LiquidPlanner we’ve identified four main stages our customers go through to optimize their projects and processes. Our most successful customers don’t try to “eat the elephant,” so to speak, as soon as they buy LiquidPlanner. They know that change and progress occur in steps. Throughout this series of blog posts, we’ll discuss each...

Just Keep Swimming: Using LiquidPlanner to Manage the Big Swim

April 9, 2019 | Liz Rosen

I spend much of my life outside of LiquidPlanner in and around bodies of water. I’m a passionate open water swimmer—marathon swimming, in particular—and a big part of that passion is giving back to the sport. Some swimmers help out at races in various capacities, some crew for other swimmers, but I volunteer my time...

How to Be Productive When You’re Overwhelmed

April 4, 2019 | Team LiquidPlanner

Has this ever happened to you? You’re having a perfectly good morning. A warm cup of coffee is in your hand, and you think you’ve got your workload under control when suddenly it hits you— You actually have a small avalanche of prioritized work to get through within the next two weeks, and it doesn’t...

Ask a PM: How to Motivate the Team When It Thinks It Should Stop

April 2, 2019 | Elizabeth Harrin

Dear Elizabeth: My project team and the exec leadership team are not on the same page. How do you motivate the team when it thinks it should stop but the senior stakeholders direct us to keep going? This situation has a major disconnect in it. Your team thinks the project should be stopped, but the...

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Ask a PM: How to Juggle Everything without Overloading Your Brain