Four Steps to Lower Stress

Kenneth has 14 years of healthcare experience in government and private industry. Over eight years of experience managing healthcare IT projects, operations, contracts, and personnel. His work experience includes project management, contracts and procurements, data analysis, claims adjudication, business writing, and business process modeling. Kenneth was certified in 2006 as a Project Management Professional.

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Project management work rarely gets dull; there are always things that need to be done, and what was important one week is not going to be the priority next week. The role and life of a project manager is ever changing. There are risks to be managed or schedules to be rewritten; someone on the team may need some assistance with their design work, and next week you may be dealing with human resource issues.

This kind of life can lead to a great deal of stress--and may even push some people over the edge and out of the project management field entirely. So how do you keep up with everything that is constantly changing around you and stay sane throughout the project…and then find a new project to jump into?

Carve Your Schedule Up
Just as you schedule the work carefully for the project, taking into account all the variables of resources, effort and constraints, you also need to carve your own personal schedule up with the same care and precision. If there is a need to update the schedule every week, then block out the time to do that update every week.

Sometimes it seems like the fires that need to be put out are more important than dealing with the weekly updates, but staying on top of the updates is vital to the well being of the project. Leave time for emergencies in your schedule, but make sure that the critical work does not get pushed off or you will …

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