Key takeaways
- Operations is the how between sales and profit; design process for people, because the deliverables do not care.
- Selling availability toward a shared goal instead of fixed scope lets a team say yes to learning during a project.
- Staff people whole or half on a project; spreading someone across six projects hides the cost of context switching.
- Plan roughly 15 percent PM time per project, keep PMs on one to four projects, and treat 25 billable hours a week as a warning line.
- Bad news does not age well; projects are never in better shape than on day one, so keep them from slipping into yellow.
About this episode
“I want every one of our PMs, and our directors actually, to have the ability to jump on something—to give that extra 20% that’s needed for a given week without having to let other balls fall.”
Agency operations is all about the numbers and processes that drive success. But it’s hard to run a profitable business if your team’s overworked or your clients are unhappy.
That’s where project management comes in.
In this episode of Time Limit, Brett talks with Sparkbox VP Rob Harr—who heads up operations—about what it takes to make a digital agency profitable and how operations and project management work together to deliver project success.
Listen to their conversation to learn:
- What agency operations is and how it shapes organizational culture
- How to boost profitability and efficiency without losing sight of people
- Simple math you can use to manage common staffing challenges
- One huge way project managers help operations run more smoothly
- How to know if operations is the right next step in your project management career