Google Apps Project Management

Using Google Docs for Project Management

Google Docs is the ultimate in real-time collaboration software. Docs offers the ability to work with colleagues on spreadsheets, documents, presentations, and more.

Google Docs also provides advanced sharing capabilities. A document’s owner can choose who can view the document and who can edit it. They can also share the document with people outside the domain, like clients.

Using an innovative method for organization called collections, users collaborating on a project can keep track of relevant documents and easily see what has been edited recently. Collections can be shared in bulk with anyone, just like individual documents. Documents can be placed in more than one collection, meaning that files such as a preexisting guide to handling a certain type of project can be placed and viewed in every relevant project’s Collection.

Using Google Groups for Project Management

Google Groups is a simple but well-featured forum and group email tool. It’s a great place to keep tabs on emails, discussions, and topics relating to a project. Group members can send and receive email from a single address. They can also start forums with other members regarding a certain email or a new topic, allowing all the people working on a project to keep up and participate.

Using Google Sites for Project Management

Google Sites is a highly usable tool for making private or public web pages hosted by Google, e.g. you could build an intranet on Google Sites. They offer a single place for organizing all the resources involved in a project. For instance, a Site can feature the project schedule, related documents, and a message board. It can also add project action items, issue tracking, and contact information for project resources. With Sites, everybody working on a project has a fully customized and live updated portal where they can see what is happening, what needs to happen, and the resources to make it happen.