5 Project Management Tools You Need to Explore

---

Are you getting used to remote work already? If you are like us, you would be looking forward to the end of social distancing protocols so you can return to work as we know it. However, it is looking increasingly likely that working in an office will not be possible any time soon. Perhaps now is the right time for you to finally look at long term solutions to make your company remote-flexible, rather than relying on band-aid solutions. In this article, we’ll break down some of our favorite remote team management tools that help us to organise our remote work and work more closely with our remote teams.

Asana is one of the most popular project management apps available today for a good reason. The cloud-based tool is straightforward to use, helping you to improve communication within your team and manage projects. Asana allows you to break down projects into specific tasks and assign them to your team members. The Premium version of the app also includes workflows that will enable you to automatically move projects along through the system without having to babysit them. Asana is not as advanced as some other project management tools, but for most teams, it packs more than enough punch. You can trial the task system for free or upgrade to their Premium package for more functionality.

If you need a project management solution than a little more meat on the bones than Asana, Basecamp is a great choice. As one of the most popular project management apps in the world, Basecamp has a very loyal following. It allows you to monitor tasks, discussions, documents, schedules, collaboration, and milestones directly through the dashboard. Basecamp is also surprisingly easy to use for the increased functionality, and shouldn’t require a lot of advanced training to get your remote teams up to speed. Additionally, there is a lot of documentation and user-generated content that can help you familiarise yourself with Basecamp.

Monday has been advertising aggressively in hopes of positioning itself as a viable Basecamp alternative. Kanban-based and visually stunning, the cloud-based project management platforms are aimed at small and mid-sized teams and uses labels to identify who is working on what. The big drawback is the price. A basic version of the service runs $25 per month, but the number of columns, which you use to track project phases, is limited to 20. On the other hand, for $39 a month, you unlock a full API and get more storage and integrations.

Trello is about as simple as it gets when it comes to project management, but that simplicity belies incredible organisational and task management power. Trello is built around the notion of bulletin boards. Each board can represent a project, for example. Within each board, teams create lists, which they then populate with cards. The cards can be assigned to specific team members, labeled, stamped with a deadline, and crammed with comments or attachments. The hierarchical nature of the system makes it flexible while still preserving a baseline simplicity. Great for visual workers.

One of the most significant issues that many remote teams run into is accurately tracking time worked and scheduling with remote workers. Since remote workers can live around the world, you often have several people collaborating on projects from different time zones. When I Work makes it easy to schedule work for employees and track their work time. It’s a perfect tool for tracking time and keeping an eye on employees that are getting paid by the hour. Employees log in and punch the clock in a convenient interface.

There is no perfect software out there that will fit all your current workflows. That is not necessarily a bad thing. These companies have built their software around the most efficient practices in the market. If your workflow does not fit, it might be worth re-assessing to make sure it is necessary. Take this process of digitalization to redesign your work. You can’t run a company remotely the same way you run a physical team after all!