Fire, Ready, Aim Is A Dangerous Project Launch Approach

Way too many small business owners use a “Fire, Ready, Aim” approach to launching projects.

In the short run, this method may seem faster than planning your efforts, but this launch approach is fraught with danger and can cost your business lost time, money, effort and worst of all, dissatisfied customers.

That’s why project management is so useful.

It will help you make the most of your resources (even if the only resource is you), manage your budget, and deliver quality solutions to your customers.

It can even help you make your internal business processes work better so it takes less time and effort to get things done.

In short, project management can help you turn chaos into order.

Here are four reasons why project management is so valuable to your small business.

1. Makes big goals achievable – With a project management approach to your goals, you can seize opportunities, solve problems and realize the success you seek.
2. Reveals gaps and pitfalls – All projects are not meant to become reality. If you’re like most small business owners, you have more ideas than you could complete in a lifetime. Using a project management approach can help you see the gaps in your thinking.
3. Breaks down the overwhelm – Do you dream big and then get exhausted thinking of all the things that have to be done to realize that dream? Project management helps you “chunk up” the work into bite sized pieces so you can make progress and avoid getting so overwhelmed that you get nothing done.
4. Gets the work out of your head – Writing down what needs to be done to accomplish your goals will help you get done faster without a lot of rework. Having to remember everything that needs to be accomplished just clutters up your brain and creates a prescription for disaster.

The first (and most important) step in using a project management approach is creating a plan for your project launch.

Now before you say you hate planning because it puts you in a box, I want to remind you that a plan is just that – a plan.

And it’s YOUR plan.

That means you have the flexibility to change it as you see fit.