For a web-based retailer to be without the web is a huge problem, but for that retailer to deliberately choose to have no access to the web is unthinkable. I worked for a company that made this decision. The business was an online store that depended on the inventory of three physical locations which did not have the internet. The employees at these locations had no sense of the overall dealings of the company, not only in terms of inventory but also in terms of project management. For instance, if a bulk web order demanded a temporary addition of employees at the warehouse, the only notifications were made by telephone, a process which often required multiple repetitious calls.

If this company would have had access to the web, web orders could have gone directly through the physical locations, and project management efficiency would have skyrocketed. Yet, with the web alone, they would still fall behind in today’s web-based project management world, where everyone can know what others are working on.

The project management system in the store I worked for was so confusing that newly accomplished projects would often be reversed by another. For example, one of the managers was in charge of assembling a complex floor display for a certain product that had not come in yet. A different manager came in the next day, unaware of the previous manager’s decisions. The display was taken down and replaced. When the product finally arrived, it never even left its box in the loading bay. I was notified of an online order for that product, and, as a new employee with no way of knowing what the managers had been doing (or what corporate wanted accomplished), I reported that the store was out of stock.

Two additional projects, I discovered later, had been centered around this new inventory. First, corporate needed the product for an upcoming marketing venture and had sent a manager to each store to ensure the display was correct. Second, the backroom manager issued a project to send excess inventory back to the warehouse. So, when the manager from corporate arrived to check the new display, the product had already been taken back.

These problems could have been avoided in several ways, but I am certain that web-based project management would have been the best solution. Unlike sticky notes on a memo board, web-based project management is a system that allows the top level of corporate to see the details of every project, down to the menial tasks of entry level employees. With all documents, media, and even time reporting stored in one centralized location, project management has never been more efficient.

Poor project management ultimately ends in failed customer relations and a stressful working environment for employees. For example, the blame for the failed projects above found its way to me, the new employee who had reported the product to be out of stock. When a customer complained, corporate called, sounding so furious that I thought I would lose my job that instant. While a variety of things would have solved this situation in the end, nothing would have improved communication better than web-based project management.