Hey buddy, this is N J here, the host of the NJ podcast. This is thriving project management, Thursdays. This is part of the everyday series where we share insights and ideas for you to become the best project manager in the world. Project management is important as joy gum. Operations keeps the lights on strategy provides light at the end of the tunnel, but it is project management. That is the trade engine that drives the organization forward. Everybody wants to be a project manager, but not everybody wants to do the hard work. Project management is not easy and simplistic, but it is worth it. And today we're going to talk about. My favorites tools, my favorite tools to use as a project management professional project management tools are the project managers best onset to manage projects. Simple projects may require a simple checklist and pen and paper, and the more complex ones with multiple intricacies dependencies resources. Uh, they'll require planning, assigned tasks, setting deadlines, making sure that everybody sticks to them and checking the time spent we'll need something that's a bit more sophisticated and sometimes you will need to, you know, quantify an objective. I segregated delegate tasks properly and proportionally. Uh, and that is where modern tools or come in. And there are a lot of project management tools and software free and paid that are there, and it can be a bit difficult to identify. What's essential, what's beneficial. And also what's not worth your time. I would suggest that we use let the tool make sure that you use something that is personally. And user friendly to you. And if you're a part of a large organization that has to have certain tools that are compliance with a certain regulations set within the company, authentic country with which you operate in, and there there's a need for things to be standardized that you get a fair with that tool, even though it may not be your favorite one, I'll give examples of managed multiple projects using Microsoft planner, Microsoft. Projects. That's a very, a very popular one. We've used trailer balls of we use Jeroboam. We've used Microsoft Azure DevOps, and you've used sometimes as CIT, pure XL and pen and paper, and the list that I'm giving now. Is my favorite tools. My favorite tools, personally, that I use to manage my own personal projects and projects that are within organizations that I provide services to the first tool that I will highlight is the agile board, the agile board. These are your agile boards, such as your Trello's. You assign. Your Mondays, uh, sometimes so projects and, and air table is quite a good one and whatever Kevin tools that are out there. So for me, these agile boards are very upgraded because you can see updates that are made in real time. You can collaborate with them. Uh, with these boards, you can create different columns and swim lanes, uh, to have things that are organized ideally. Well, what is common when you use it? The agile boards who have your columns such as your to do and progress and completed. And you can a software project, you can break them down according to the phase that you're in, such as in progress to do in progress, uh, development, testing, uh, QA, um, ready for deployment product owner review, depending on the. The phase that the, how you decided to tailor it for yourself. For me, I get a level of satisfaction from being able to have it. They caught on an agile board, whether it's a trailer or at the classes. Fantastic for this, where you can drag a card and put comments and attach screenshots and documents, and you can see traceability and dates and timestamps and, um, an audit trail on these tasks and they can get your free version. You can get your paid for. But the biggest thing about this is that you're able to collaborate in real time and have conversations on them. Uh, so I prefer the agile boards because it's simple, simpler to use for the best agile port to use out there. If you're looking for a free version. Yeah. I would go for Trello. And if you are in an organization that's willing to shove up the investments, I'll go for a JIRA board, go for a bit less than three JIRA and confluence. And I know that. That our capability compliant. Uh, they have got some compliance regulations. You may go for a short DevOps, but for me, uh, one of my favorites is the agile board because of the collaboration element of it. I even have my own personal projects when you put them together, podcasts and books, and you collaborate in with, uh, another team, uh, they can be great to use because you can see the changes and collaborate in real time. So an agile board is very. Very useful to me. You sometimes you've been quoted as a Kanban board, um, but it allows you for you to actually visualize the cards and where the progress is and what the task is about. And one thing that's very important is to have the visibility tool that gives you visibility and allows you to have a concept PNC and predictability. So it's, it's great, but agile boards are up there for me. The next tool. This is quite old school for me. And this is your Microsoft Excel and your Google sheets. I believe that to this day, that one of the best products Microsoft ever put together. Is Microsoft Excel. There's so much that you can do for it, with it. And nowadays Google sheets has become more of a preference maybe because it's cloud-based and I don't, I need to keep on pressing, save on my local machine or on my PC because that updates them in real time. And the saved in real time with Google sheets, I can see. I can see the updates that are being made. And as a project manager, sometimes a simple list is what you need. Do you have a list of items that you need to do at description of what needs to be done, states of what needs to be done, any comments that you need to have and who you reading to assign it to. And at times you may not need to use an agile. Sometimes do something. That's very, that that's simplistic. If you need something to get something done, uh, quite quickly, uh, other project managers may start getting fancy with it, then create gunshots out of S up in the dependencies and the lake, but for a more comprehensive project management suite that is based in Excel and that you can export to Excel would be Microsoft projects. And that is sometimes the gold standard. When you use it, when you're managing a project, you'd have Microsoft projects. You can have. The local one that's, uh, that's that you can use the machine and other one that is cloud based, that's based on the cloud. You can save the provost there. And that for me, Microsoft Excel and Google sheets is up there for me because of the simplicity of it. And just how ubiquitous it is a lot. I don't think there's anyone I've worked with that has never heard of Microsoft Excel or even Google. Then another tool that's uh, good for me that I like to use is good. Old fashioned pen and paper, pen and paper. That pen paper notebook, a flip chart because they're meeting. Sometimes I process my information better when I'm writing down physical. It can be time consuming for me to transfer those physical notes, to digital, to digital, to make sure that they're safe. I would suggest that that be done. Sometimes I need to conceptualize a project, conceptualize a phase, uh, draw things out to a so that they can make sense to me before I go. And may I make them digital pen and paper, or sometimes it comes in handy for me. And it definitely does work because I can draw things out and I'll go to meetings. You say, what are the dependencies? What's the context diagram for the systems and how things interact and work together. So I can put a visual together for me to conceptualize things and a pen and paper works in me. My handwriting is atrocious, so it can, it can betray me at times, pen a paper can betray me, but pen and paper has worked well for me. The next hour, a tool I like to use, which is more collaboration is your instant chat, instant chat. This can be your Microsoft, the teams. This can be your, your Skype for business. This can be your Google hat. How's your Google chats. And this can be your slack. Uh, whatever the instant chat tool is because sometimes you have your email, uh, which is very good to have an email trail. However, if you need a quick turnaround and you need to get your team together to start having conversations, or you just need to shoot someone a quick message and you guys are all on the same platform, isn't chat can be very good for you too. Uh, get the message across quickly and to get a, to get a response very quickly and chat is very good. And then obviously with the instant chat functionality, you can also have video calls. You can have your audio calls just to have that very quick message. Sometimes when you're on the V on your credit. Cause you need to record the session before you record the session, make sure that people know. Uh, privacy concerns, but instant shots. If you're looking for quick turnaround time for answers and you guys are on the same platform, they can work faster and nimbler than email one of my, the next and the last favorite tool that I would like to cover in my favorite tools is a comprehensive stakeholder, less than stakeholder map. This can say. Lives. Okay. This can save lives. If you don't know who you need to communicate to how often in which manner and where and how you communicate with them, you can get yourself in a lot of trouble. And there is a saying that the biggest frustration of communication. Is the illusion that it has taken place in the first place. And that is can come down to you not having a comprehensive stakeholders. This can be writing down the, putting down the name, the contact details, the email, the role responsibility, how you to contact them, keep it in one place and XR, Google sheets can work in your, in your favor. I know that you can use agile boards and. Uh, places like confluence or a Wiki for different tools where you can put your stakeholder list there, you can also put it in Microsoft word or. Well PowerPoint, but a good that's why I like excellent Google sheets, because you can do so much with it, have that stakeholder list and make sure you're able to refer to it and go back to it. Because when you say you need to get sign off from a certain client, use who they are, and if you need, um, to be able to get a deployment plan or to escalate a certain issue, make sure you've got that stakeholders and you review it and update it on a consistent basis. Stakeholder. Have gotten me into trouble and they've saved my life before. Well, may it not to be eliminated, be dramatic. They've saved me on the projects. Okay. But the stakeholder list, comprehensive updates, it stakeholder list will save lives. So those are my favorite tools. Um, an agile board sometimes known as a Kanban board. If JIRA Santa's Monday, uh, the Atlassian suite. Trento I've listed my favorite ones. And then you can have your Microsoft Excel and your Google sheets, pen and paper as a yes, yet to fail me and your instant chats that you can use it on slack or Microsoft teams, Skype for business, Google hangout, Google chats, and then a comprehensive stakeholder list that you use that you refer to promise you. This can save lives. Uh, hopefully I hope you enjoy this episode of par five in project management Thursday is that we talked about my favorite tools. Please also let me know what your favorite tools are, what the pros and cons are and what situation you would use them. If you liked this episode, please like share comment and subscribe. And if you're interested in any books and merchandise, please head over to the website. And have a fantastic that item, project management Thursday, use your favorite tools be proficiency on the end because they can come handy for us as project management professionals on our projects and on our own personal lives. And I remember project management is important. Because Joe guns eloquently put its operations, keeps the lights on strategy, provides light at the end of the tunnel, but it is project management that is a train or a train engine that drives the organization forward. Everybody wants to be a project manager, but not everybody wants to do the hard work. And I will see you on the next episode.