Tips for Reducing Overall Project Length
What’s the most effective way to startup your project
5 Minutes
Share your Timing Expectations up front. More preparation before starting and faster feedback turnarounds are the key.
Express Your Timing Needs Up Front
This might sound super obvious, but letting your project manager know what you need for overall turnaround for the specific deliverables up front is one of the keys. This will begin the sometimes difficult conversation of getting priorities and expectations clarified before starting.
Collaborate with your Project Manager to establish a Workback Schedule for your deliverables
Establishing a workback schedule with your project manager is essential to ensure the timely delivery of your project. It will also prompt discussions about your capacity to provide feedback during the production process, which is crucial to meeting your expectations.
Our Process Includes 3 Drafts and 3 Feedbacks
To achieve a high-quality end product, we require thorough feedback on each draft, leading to a longer process. It’s crucial to set realistic expectations to avoid compromising quality for the sake of timing. We’ve found that inadequate planning for feedback time on the client’s side is often the reason for project delays.
Ask your team, how quickly can we realistically turnaround our consolidated feedback?
To avoid delays, it’s essential to align your workback schedule with your team’s realistic capacity to incorporate and implement your feedback.
Be Aware of the Challenge of Sameday Feedback
We advise clients to work on a sameday feedback basis for rushed projects.
Create a series of calendar events for each scheduled draft feedback
We advise clients to create a series of calendar events with key personnel that are needed to collect all of your feedback. That way everyone has it in their calendar and is prepared for the time it will take to review the work and consolidate all of the different views on your team.
Our plan needs to incorporate your Project Managers time needed to clarify your feedback
Remember your Dreamlife Rep will have questions on your feedback.
Remember there are a lot of files needed to start work
Often we can’t even start work because we are missing key files. So getting all of the relevant files in a singular folder and ready to go is an absolute must to ensure your timing needs.
Flag to your Project Manager what design elements won’t be ready in time
Often we are working under the gun before particular design elements are finished. When you are rushing through a project, we need to be realistic about missing information and set expectations for what will be represented in lieu of having full information. We’re here to help so it’s better that we are open and honest about what is missing so it doesn’t come back to haunt us later in the process.
Pro-Tip Bottom Line
Start Strong: Communicate Your Timing Needs with Your Dreamlife Manager
Letting your Dreamlife manager know your timing needs from the start will help in creating a workback schedule that takes into account your project’s unique turnaround time, including the time needed for gathering comments from all relevant parties. This will allow you to flag issues early on, set more realistic expectations, and ultimately become more efficient in the project’s development process.