Best Project Portfolio Management

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Project managers know how individual actions affect the big picture. And if you can’t see that picture you’re flying blind. Our research helps avoid this. The best PM software for most use cases is Monday.com, a robust platform that gives you all the project management firepower you need to keep organized. With multiple views and ways to organize data, you can make more informed decisions and keep things running as smoothly as possible.

The Best Project Portfolio Management Tool For Most

Monday.com is perfect for most businesses because of its flexibility and customizability. It keeps your team organized and projects on track. Plus it helps you manage more than one project at a time. So you look like a project management guru. Almost instantly you’ll learn more details that’ll give you the edge you need, turning your project management pitfalls into wins.

Monday.com has an easily adjustable user interface, that suits your needs immediately. Say goodbye to the clunky platform that’s hard to learn. If you have been wanting a simple solution to being more organized, while enjoying the projects you keep efficient, then keep reading to find out how Monday.com does it for you.

The Best Project Portfolio Management Tools to Consider: 

1. Monday.com — The best for most
2. Hive — Best for collaboration
3. Asana — The best PPM for ease of use
4. Smartsheet — Best PPM for reporting and analytics
5. Oracle Primavera P6 — Best PPM platform for enterprise businesses
6. Changepoint — Best for strategic portfolio ,anagement
7. Proggio — Best PPM for fans of Jira

When It Makes Sense to Invest in Project Portfolio Management Software

Investing in a project portfolio management tool is a significant decision for any business. You will need to be sure it’s necessary, and that now is the right time.

But how do you know when that is?

The answer is to think about your business and upcoming projects and how closely they align for the future.

One of the best features of a PPM tool is that it helps ensure your projects fit within the overall scope of a larger strategic plan.

If keeping track of budgets and timelines is becoming more and more critical for your business and the team is rapidly growing, then now is probably the right time to invest in one.

However, if you’re just starting out, then PPM software may not be essential right now, though there’s a good chance it will be later.

The bottom line: Think carefully about what stage your business is at, the size of your team, and your goals going forward.

#1 – Monday.com — Best for Most

Monday.com is one of the best tools for flexibility and customization for project management. Intuitive layouts and a simple visual design complement highly customizable dashboards, allowing you to design the workflow that is right for you and your team.

Flexibility and customization is how Monday.com differentiates itself from the competition. You have the ability to tweak and adjust the layout to your satisfaction.

In the starting grid-style setup, you can choose what goes into it, define the columns, and choose from a variety of different views.

Monday.com isn’t just about high level of customization, though—it also includes the following useful features:

• Activity logging
• Customizable fields
• Due date tracking
• Email updates
• Execution boards
• Motivational tools
• Pipedrive integration
• Relevant updates
• Time-tracking by project
• User access controls

Monday.com integrates with over 36 types of applications, from Outlook to Dropbox, Zendesk to Mailchimp, the list continues to grow. You can even move information between the different app integrations, saving you the all-important commodity that is time.

Automations are another nifty feature that helps to complete the fully integrated approach of Monday.com. They allow you to link key processes together—for example, if a project is marked as complete, team leaders will receive an email straight to their inbox. This is very handy and help you stay on top of everything.

Better still, you can start using Monday.com completely for free. It allows for unlimited boards and docs for up to two users. You also get over 200 templates and the Monday.com app for iOS and Android.

For most teams, you’ll need a plan where you pay for each seat. Good news is, they’re quite reasonably priced.

The Standard plan cost $10 per user per month while Pro costs $16 per user per month. Standard gives you access to all the crucial features of the platform and up to 250 automations and integrations per month.

Beyond allowing for 100 times the automations and integrations allowed, Pro also unlocks time tracking, custom dashboards, access restriction (allowing for private boards and documents), and more.

You can also opt for the Enteprise plan, which delivers a custom solution for your organization at a custom price.

You can get started with Monday.com in three simple steps today.

#2 – Hive — The Best for Collaboration

If you’re looking for a PPM tool that strongly focuses on collaboration between teams, then Hive is best. It’s a cloud collaborative project management software that allows you to see who is working on what and what’s holding up or delaying projects.

Allowing you to see all documents, updates, and specific project details in one place, and then having the ability to coordinate efforts between team members is essential, and Hive excels here.

Companies such as Uber, IBM, and Starbucks think so as well and are Hive users.

Collaborative prowess aside for one second, Hive also offers the following features:

• Action templates and cards
• File sharing
• Analytics
• Predictive alerts
• Time tracking and resourcing
• Project tracking
• Gantt charts and direct messages
• Automatic updates
• Files and folders
• Simple, intuitive workflows

We were particularly impressed with Hive’s email integration, which allows you to send and receive Gmail and Outlook emails directly from the app. This helps the PPM software to feel like a complete solution that’s integrated with essential tools you use every day, and it saves time and hassle of switching from one tab to another repeatedly.

The ‘Action Cards’ serve at the core of Hive’s collaborative approach, where you can tag other team members, use the native chat option, or simply attach files to share. When coupled with the previously mentioned email integration, this means all your communication can be centralized and ready to go.

Hive’s pricing is simple and straightforward.

There’s a free version that allows for up to two users. You get access to all of Hive’s project management tools, but it lacks integrations, reporting, time tracking, security and access control, and more. You also can’t utilize Hive’s support.

To get most of what Hive has to offer, opt for Hive Teams. That runs $12 per user per month and allows you to integrate the platform with Salesforce, Jira, Slack, and Zoom, as well as enabling Zapier integrations.

For greater support from Hive, including a dedicated success manager and ongoing team training, you can choose Hive’s enterprise option. It’s custom priced in order to be tailored to your team’s exact needs.

Get started by testing out Hive on its free version today.

#3 – Asana — The Best PPM for Ease of Use

Asana prides itself on being one of the most user-friendly PPM tools out there, and we have to say, we agree. This is a no-fuss, no-nonsense PPM tool for those who just want to get up and running as quickly and smoothly as possible.

Asana offers far more than just a user-friendly interface, but it’s certainly a defining feature of the software that helps it stand out from the competition. If that’s a key concern for your business (and your team), then look no further.

Asana is a flexible tool with a keen focus on collaboration. In fact, the software is far more about productivity than tracking projects, and as such, it lacks features like built-in time tracking and advanced timelines for your portfolios.

With that said, it makes up for this when it comes to task management, offering a flexible and customizable interface that is intuitive from the very beginning. In this area, it’s hard to beat.

Once you sign up for the web software, you’ll be able to use:

• Customizable dashboards 
• Focus mode and individual task lists
• Subtask assignments
• Prioritization features
• Custom calendars
• Email integration
• Notifications and reminders
• Automated updates
• Setting priorities and due dates
• Group discussions and meetings

Asana’s focus mode is a feature we particularly like, giving you the ability to focus on specific tasks and excluding those that don’t align with your current strategy. Each task and subtask feature a deadline and name, and these are individually tracked, allowing you to stay on top of things.

We’d like to say that Asana’s pricing is as easy to follow as the software itself, but that, unfortunately, isn’t true. It features four differing plans, including:

1. Basic: Free.
2. Premium: $10.99 a month, per user.
3. Business: $24.99 a month, per user.
4. Enterprise: Custom pricing is available by contacting Asana directly.

Going up each tier of the pricing structure gives you more features to play with, and we think the Business plan is a must for companies of most sizes.

You can sign up for a free trial of Asana to see if it’s right for you here.

#4 – Smartsheet — Best for Using Reporting and Analytics To Understand Your Business

Smartsheet is unlikely to win any awards for being the best PPM tool outright, but its reporting features are among the strongest you’ll find. Real-time metrics and powerful visualization tools are ideal for businesses that prioritize data above all else.

From automated workflows to cross-data spreadsheets, Smartsheet is a versatile tool for your business. Still, the learning curve can certainly be steep, and it lacks basic collaboration features you can find elsewhere.

In line with what you might expect, Smartsheet’s other features are primarily data-focused and include the following:

• Budgeting and change management
• Basic collaboration features
• Milestone tracking
• Portfolio management
• Functional layouts
• Project planning
• Reporting and analytics
• Requirements management
• Real-time visibility
• Resource management

Anyone familiar with Microsoft Excel will feel immediately at home with Smartsheet. The difference is that this is like a version of Microsoft Excel which can quickly create checklists of tasks for projects and then assign them to individual team members.

This is another area where Smartsheet has an advantage over more traditional PPM tools; there’s virtually no limit to the number of custom fields that can be assigned to your tasks. It’s also easy to drag and drop the tasks within the spreadsheets you create.

When it comes to the pricing, Smartsheet isn’t the simplest, and it could be a bit clearer. It comes in four different tiers that are split into two separate groups:

The ‘Standard’ group features the following plans:

1. Individual: $14 per month for a single user.
2. Business: $25 per month, per user.

The ‘Enterprise’ group offers these plans:

1. Enterprise: All of the Business plan features, with a custom price only given upon contact.
2. Premier: All of the features of the Enterprise plan, along with additional and premium options, including dynamic views and a data uploader. This is also custom pricing given upon contact.

There’s a 30-day free trial available of Smartsheet, and you can sign up for it here.

#5 – Oracle Primavera P6 — Best for Enterprise Businesses

Sometimes businesses need powerful software to manage large and ever more complicated projects, and that’s where Oracle Primavera P6 comes in. It’s the ideal choice for enterprise businesses.

While this PPM software isn’t reserved for enterprise business, it’s fair to say that managing smaller and simpler schedules using it may prove to be more trouble than it’s worth. But if you’re a large business with extensive projects, this software is unlikely to disappoint.

Oracle Primavera P6 allows you to plan, manage, and execute programs and portfolios with robust graphical workflows and streamlined enterprise-level reporting for your business.

Features include:

• Planning, scheduling, and controlling large-scale programs and individual projects
• Secure multiuser access to schedules
• Allowing project managers to coordinate costs
• Opening and scheduling multiple projects simultaneously
• Adapting and changing your views
• Powerful risk management
• Team member interfaces for gathering status updates
• Gantt charts
• Real-time reporting and analytics
• Configurable forms

Oracle Primavera P6 offers cloud access, real-time and adaptable views, and is perfect for considerable project tracking and team collaboration.

The tracking, specifically, allows team leaders to see who is excelling in their area and helps inform them to better delegate tasks out to others, improving efficiency all round.

This is cloud-based software, which means that employees can easily access data wherever they are, and it’s fast to use, too. Always having the physical copies of data available is a thing of the past.

There are few limits regarding the size of the workforce it can support, and even if it’s a team numbering in the thousands based all over the world, Oracle Primavera P6 won’t buckle.

The Oracle Primavera software suite offers more than one product, but the two you will come across the most are:

1. Primavera P6 Professional Project Portfolio Management (PPM: Windows-based) priced at $2,350.
2. Primavera P6 Enterprise Project Portfolio Management (EPPM: Web-based) priced at $3,100.

The Primavera P6 download process gives you a free trial of the Professional PPM software.

A self-guided demo of the Enterprise version is available here.

#6 – Changepoint — Best for Strategic Portfolio Management

Changepoint is a PPM tool best suited for businesses that need to keep their portfolios aligned with ongoing corporate strategy. Strategic portfolio management (SPM) is about deciding where finite resources should be allocated and where and when not to make trade-offs.

Changepoint fully embraces that and enables companies to increase their portfolio velocity with dedicated road-mapping, prioritization, and resource allocation.

Some of the highlights of using Changepoint include the following features:

•  Survey management
• Greater control over projects
• Client collaboration
• Smarter investments
•  Increased insight
• Workflow management
• Knowledge management
• Improved client satisfaction
• Uses a single, integrated platform
• Performance management

Changepoint allows you to monitor and measure performance across the team, too. With detailed performance plans and metrics available, it’s great for those businesses that want to provide targeted mentoring and train up staff in the areas they need for the future.

We did, however, find that scheduling within the software could be a bit more accessible.

When it comes to pricing, it’s simple. Changepoint prefers you to contact them to discuss a price for your specific needs. You can also request a free demo to give you an idea of how the software will work for your company.

You can get started with Changepoint right here.

#7 – Proggio — Best PPM for Fans of Jira

Proggio is the top choice for those of you that use Jira as a project management tool. Jira is popular in the agile domain because of its workflow capabilities and issue tracking abilities. Proggio integrates directly with Jira almost effortlessly, and the two combined make for a powerful team.

Using Jira with the rest of the software results in an easy-to-use tool that makes planning and project management a breeze. You can certainly expect a boost to productivity and your strategic planning.

With Proggio, you’ll be able to create plans for your projects and much more, and this includes the following helpful features:

• Backlog management
• Gantt and timeline view
• Kanban boards
• Negative feedback management
• Prioritization features
• Request management
• Resource management
• Real-time status updates
• Project timelines
• Visual resource management

The project manager within the software can assign team members to specific tasks, allowing you to watch their progress, and it also provides updates via handy color-coded statuses so you can easily keep track of everything. The visual elements help give clarity and boost the overall ease of use.

The project mapping capabilities are generally excellent, too. You can assign tasks to members, allocate resources, and prioritize events with just a few simple clicks. Percentage completion clocks are another little extra that helps you to track projects without fuss.

It’s hard to fault such a clever piece of software, but Proggio’s customer support options could be better as they are quite limited compared to some of the others. Again, though, we’re nitpicking here more than anything.

Proggio comes in three distinct plans:

1. Starter: Free to use but with limited options. Jira integration is available for 30 days on this plan.
2. Business: $19 per month, per user. Jira integration is included.
3. Premium: Custom pricing, fully-featured, and available for over 20 users.

You can create an account with Proggio right here.

Methodology For Choosing The Best Project Portfolio Management Software

Now you know our top picks for the best project portfolio management tools. But a key question you may have is: How did we go about deciding which of them made our list?

This is the methodology we used to make the final decisions, and these are the essential features you should be looking at before making your decision.

Resource Management

You might be a business that needs to make every project count due to limited resources. If so, it’s important to think about your overall capacity and how many projects you can move forward with before setting off.

A good PPM tool will help here—making sure you don’t take on more than you can realistically achieve—by allowing you to see critical data to stay on top of things. In essence, it’s about improving your efficiency as a business, and every PPM software worth talking about will help you to do just that. This is an essential factor, so think carefully.

Financial Planning

It almost goes without saying how vital financial planning is for a business. It’s one of the key parts of project management and, as such, needs great consideration. Frequently going over budget could set in motion a series of events that will leave your business struggling to survive.

PPM software will help to stop that from becoming a reality. You’ll be able to allocate your finances where they are needed, ensuring projects get completed without breaking your budget in the process.

Collaboration Tools

Collaboration tools allow you to work with your team and potential clients without barriers. Each tool will have something different to offer in this category, so it’s worth thinking about what exactly you need to function properly. A lack of communication can hamper a business.

For example, is the ability to talk with your team in real-time essential? What about comments and documentation? Do you require extensive communication features within the software, or is that already taken care of elsewhere? You do need to spend time considering this, even if it might not be quite as crucial as managing your resources.

Number of Users

Don’t forget that most PPM software will charge you per user every month. Some even have a maximum number of users, so you need to consider how many users your business will need before moving forward.

If you don’t, you could end up with certain team members being unable to use the same software as everyone else—this is the last thing you want in your everyday operations.

Automation/Integrations

Automation and available integrations are an area that can vary significantly between different PPM software. Some will offer basic features, while others make them a key part of their offering. The question is how important they are for your company.

Automations help you to save time you could be using elsewhere, thereby increasing your overall output. Integrations centralize everything and make your life much easier.

Are business rules/logic essential to your daily operations? How about automated task management or the ability to receive an email to your inbox when each project is updated? Do you need invoicing tools or CRM solutions integrated within the software?

In other words, what specifically do you and don’t you need? You need to think carefully about this.

Summary

There is no single best PPM tool because it entirely depends on your business’s and individual needs.

With that said.

Enterprise businesses will favor Primavera P6, while Smartsheet is all about analytics and reports. Likewise, being user-friendly is crucial for some, and Asana has you covered there.

If you’re a Jira fan, you’ll prefer Proggio, and Changepoint is ideal for strategic portfolio management.

Maybe collaboration features are key for you like Hive offers, or perhaps what you want is customization and flexibility which most business prefer; if so, opt for Monday.com.

Be sure to think carefully and use our methodology to work out the most suitable PPM tool for you.