Functions and Types of Project Management Software

Many years before software was born, businesses used to carry out project management through papers. As such, a lot of paper documents were produced. This made it very difficult to search for information and the experience was not pleasant at all.
As soon as software was available, especially at an affordable cost for various business organizations, software development companies ventured into developing project management software. Within few years, this became very popular among all the industries and project management community swiftly adopted project management software.
Projects can be very complex. They can be dependent on various factors, departments and outcomes.
As such, project management software can help a great deal when it comes to determining which events depend on one another and how exactly such events depend on each other.
Furthermore, project management software can schedule team members to work on various tasks and detail everything else that might be required, from physical to financial and so on. This is actually called scheduling.
Project management software also helps people to deal with any uncertainties in the estimates of the period of each task that form part of an overall objective. Project managers use project management software to arrange tasks within the deadlines and to jungle multiple projects at the same time.

Types of Project Management

Vendors and service providers have different ways in which they make project management software available.
• Desktop Project Management Software
To begin with, business organizations can buy project management software as a desktop package and this generally gives individual users the most responsive and graphically intense type of interface.
Typically, desktop applications often store their data in a file, but some are able to collaborate with other users and allow for the storage of data in a central database.
Many users can actually share file-based project plans, especially if it is stored on a network drive, if only one user accesses it at one given time.
• Web-based project management software
Business organizations can implement project management software as a web application. This can be accessed either through an intranet or extranet by means of a web browser. Just like web applications, web-based project management software has usual advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages

• Can be accessed easily from any type of computer without necessarily installing software
• Offers multi-user facilities
• The service provider updates and maintains the software automatically
• Ease of access and control

Disadvantages

• Project information is only available when the user is online
• Tends to be slower to respond as compared to desktop applications

Collaborative project management software

Collaborative project management systems are also available. These applications are designed to support many users working on different sections of a project. Sever-based project management software holds project data centrally. It can also incorporate collaboration tools to allow users to share knowledge and expertise.

Integrated project management software

Integrated systems are also available. These systems are designed to combine project management or planning with several other aspects of company activities. For instance, bug tracking issues can easily be assigned to each project, and the list of project customers can develop into a customer relationship management module, with every individual on the project plan having their own specific calendars, task lists as well as messaging functionality associated with their project.