As project-driven organizations, professional services firms must effectively manage the entire project lifecycle from estimating to billing and through to project closeout.  Poor project management at any point in the process can erode a project’s profitability. Fortunately, there are many opportunities where solid project planning and project control processes can help maximize project profitability—all of which can be achieved with the right strategy and technology to support them:

Creating accurate estimates and budgets. The first opportunity to optimize a project’s performance is before the project even starts. A professional services automation (PSA) system that is integrated with your CRM software enables you to start the creation of an accurate project plan and estimate early in the sales or business development phase.

Optimizing resources. Another area that can impact project performance is resourcing, and whether you might be over or under-resourcing a project relative to the budget.  Professional services automation tools that have built-in resource scheduling and utilization management tools can help you better control project schedules and deliverables.

Ensuring on-time, on-budget delivery. Firms can take a big hit when they don’t get work done on time. Your project managers need complete, real-time visibility into project progress and utilization to ensure on-time and on-budget delivery.

These are just a few areas that can be addressed with project and resource management software, which can also help facilitate collaboration across project teams, simplify the capture and approval of project time and expenses, and provide visibility into burn rates and project profitability.