Do you want your career in project management to stagnate, or do you have aspirations of reaching the upper echelon of your industry? If you would rather achieve the latter, then you must always be looking for ways to take your career in your field to the next level.

Here’s everything that you must do if you want to progress in your career a project manager.

Define your vision

Every time that you take on a new project, you need to envisage what you want the result to look like. By defining this vision and keeping it in your mind’s eye at all times, you will find it easier to make decisions that actively contribute to the long-term success of the project.

Should you ever find it difficult to create and define a vision for a specific project, be sure to follow this advice:

• Know your overarching aspirations
• Consider your company’s values, brand, and message
• Never be ambiguous — be clear and concise
• Be forward-thinking
• Establish firm timeframes

Use PM software

If you want to be the best project manager that you can be on a day-to-day basis, then you need to take full advantage of project management software. With a PM software solution at your side, you will find it much easier to plan your projects and allocate resources.

Ultimately, this will allow you to keep to a tighter schedule and devote more of your time to getting the most out of the teams that you manage.

Do you feel that you could benefit from having PM software at your disposal? If so, convince your employer to invest in it right away! This technological tool could very well prove to be the difference between you going through the motions in your career and reaching your full professional potential.

Speaking of software, there is plenty out there that you can use to help improve your knowledge around project management. Education might have been the route you’ve been down before to gain a basic understanding of if project management.

However, continual training will allow you to keep up to date with new guidelines, and what’s seen to be best practice. You can receive an online pmp certification in no time. As project sizes grow and so does the demand of the customer, keeping up to date with training courses so that you always feel ready to take on a project.

A career in project management is often one people have for life because there’s just so much excitement to get out of it, and one of the reasons for that is the world of project management is always growing and changing.

Maintain great communication

How you communicate with your team members will make or break your chances of succeeding in the field of project management.

Sometimes, this might mean pulling third-parties into the conversation, like in the case of landlord/tenant relationship managers, to keep communication flowing smoothly. Some people get defensive when talking directly to their manager so having a company or individual there as a buffer can be a great help.

Quite simply, you must be able to collaborate with every person that you manage clearly and coherently. Anything less, and your abilities as a project manager will be cast into serious doubt among your colleagues.

To maintain great communication with your team members throughout each project, you must:

• Establish an open-door policy and enforce it all times
• Open yourself up to reciprocal feedback
• Be clear when delegating tasks
• Allocate the correct communication resources
• Identify several group leaders and empower them
• Understand the important role diversity plays in the workplace
• Play to everyone’s strengths
• Be honest, open and transparent with your team at all times
• Embrace mobile communication technology
• Ask for feedback regularly
• Be accountable for your actions, especially when you make a mistake

No matter what stage you are currently at in your career as a project manager, you should always look for new ways to take it to the next level. Put the above advice into practice, and you’ll be sure to do just that.