Improvisation has no place in the everyday life of a manager. Whether working in the office or remotely, he or she must select accurate and efficient tools to always be in contact with teams and monitor their work. Discover manager tools that will improve your daily life.
Among manager tools, first let's talk about shared calendars. In fact, the day-to-day manager must be able to learn about the availability of his or her colleagues in one click. Knowing how to manage means being aware of what is going on within the team: who is on vacation, in a meeting, at an event, etc.
You should know that Planzone offers an advanced calendar tool that can be synchronized in real time with Google Calendar and is compatible with other external calendars.
Knowing about the team's availability is indispensable in scheduling his or her own meetings. And because the day-to-day manager isn't always alongside his or her teams, he or she must use powerful tools that allow him or her to be a good manager, even when working remotely.
Video conferencing can be very useful in making online presentations and collaborating directly from his or her computer. In addition, it allows managers to see the face of their team to create a warmer climate. We particularly like GoToMeeting or WebEx from Cisco.
What's Pierre working on? With whom? Are they on time? What's next? A whole bunch of issues the manager asks on a daily basis. This is why the use of a task management system is naturally found in the manager tools.
A feature that is also central in Planzone: creating task lists, assigning team members, or even setting deadlines are the basis for effective work management. It is even possible to add constraints, comments, and documents to be even more specific in what needs to be done.
Speaking of documents... Between the meeting minutes, schedules, and KPIs, the manager can quickly lose valuable time looking for all the files that he or she must share with the team or Management. Or even making sure that it's the right version.
A good manager has known for a long time that just storing files on the computer is not enough, you have to think about the Cloud! Many publishers are specialized in cloud-based electronic document management solutions like Google with its Google Drive, a partner of Planzone for synchronizing documents.
Being a good manager means knowing how to manage. But knowing how to manage also include communication! And just like video-conferencing tools, online chat tools are very useful when you have to manage a work team remotely.
Skype, or even Microsoft Lync, allow you to keep in touch with your team by launching group discussions. This real time communication is a true advantage for not losing contact with your team and simply collaborating on a daily basis.
Planning activities, seeing the work progress of each employee, anticipating delays - it's all part of knowing how to manage. Excel has long been proven in this area, but is no longer really adapted to today's managerial practices: collaboration, immediacy, and using digital technology. This is why we must move towards solutions that meet the basics of management while being more contemporary.
In the wide range of manager tools offered by Planzone, you’ll find the famous Gantt chart! Be caution, we aren't talking about the one used in the 1900s. It's collaborative, dynamic online scheduling system, which uses real time updates.
You'll understand that Planzone delivers a complete and effective solution to improve your performance on a daily basis and allow you to better manage your team wherever you are. So, feel free to try it out, it's free and there's no obligation!