Spend more time being creative with these top tips for improving your project management skills. It isn't the sexiest side of design, but solid project management facilitates creativity. After all, the faster you clear the essential business side of things, the more time you have for the creative. Better time management is part of it (read nine tips here), but there are many other things you can do to. Here are seven tips for working more efficiently...
A tidy desk is a tidy mind (image: Jo Gulliver) Whether or not the old adage is true, a bit of organisation – both physically and digitally – certainly goes a long way. Set up email folders, filing systems and job numbers, and keep on top of them. Add dates to the start of file names in year/month/day format so that different versions are listed in order, and always name and manage your layers. Trying to decipher what's going on retrospectively is just a waste of time, and having to go back to the client to ask for files again because a download's expired can be embarrassing.
Organise your workspace to suit you. It should be second nature: if you're constantly looking for a particular function, it'll chip away at your working time. When you're used to the location of everything it'll free up more of your energy to focus on the project at hand. If you have a laptop, set up a separate monitor and use the laptop for all your panels, leaving your monitor completely free for the design work. Of course, when you use the laptop on its own the screen will be covered in panels. To work around this, set up two custom workspaces in your design software.
One of the quickest ways to speed up your workflow is to set up shortcuts – and learn them. Also, if you repeatedly do certain procedures in Photoshop, why not record them as an action?
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