Class Central is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Kadenze

Project Management for Designers

Emily Carr University of Art + Design via Kadenze

Overview

Project Management for Designers is intended for students who would like a broad exposure to the field of Design, with a specific interest in administration and management. This curriculum investigates the practical, business side of design: getting organized and staying on-track through timeline projections, cost estimates and workflow charts in order to ensure success and profitability. Students will study the essential paperwork – estimates, memos, model releases, change orders and contact reports – and will look at contracts and copyright issues, and when to get legal and accounting assistance. Students will also learn the principles of research, and its important role in the work of a designer. From working in a small to mid-size design studio, to more independent roles, students will gain important skills in both understanding the context and needs of designers and the field broadly, and strategies for developing administrative processes that support these practices.

The program is intended for students who already have foundational training in Design, and who are looking to move into a design field in an administrative capacity, or for designers who are interested in gaining valuable management knowledge. On completion of the modules, students will understand the principles of how to make a business work cleanly and efficiently, how to manage yourself and your workflow, and how to ensure client relationships are productive and clear.

Syllabus

  • Client Relations: Pitfalls & Best Practices
    • This session gets into the nitty-gritty of working with a client: how to handle comps, work with difficult clients, listen effectively, follow up, and move a project forward. Also, Scope Creep! What is it, and how to work with it.
  • Bringing a Project to Launch
    • This session will look at how to bring a project towards successful completion. We’ll learn how to avoid issues before they arise through the use of milestone checks, quality assurance and beta testing, and how to handle issues such as client bottlenecks, project changes, and our own mistakes.
  • Before a Project Starts - Part II
    • This session will focus on how to create a contract that solidifies an agreement with the client, including expectations, estimates, signing, and how to handle red flags or other situations that may arise.
  • The Project Begins
    • This session will focus on how to ensure a project runs smoothly from the beginning, through the use of meetings, timelines, milestones and deadlines, feedback and signoff processes - and how and when to adjust if the timeline changes.
  • Self-Management
    • This session will introduce tools and strategies for self-management. We will look at how to manage more than one project at a time while staying sane, keeping clients happy and never missing a deadline through effective time management, communication and billing.
  • Wrapping Up
    • This session will cover essential steps for ending a project well. We’ll learn how to launch the project, handle post-launch issues and press, how (and why) to do a postmortem, arrange final payment, keep the door open for future work, manage any upgrades, changes, retainer agreements or nasty surprises, and wrap up!
  • Before a Project Starts - Part I
    • This session will focus on how to gather information at the beginning of a project to understand the clients’ needs and create accurate (and inaccurate!) estimates.
  • Where We Begin
    • This session will introduce the basics of project management for designers: how it works, and how it can optimize workflow, time management, growth and general sanity. We will discuss both the practice and practical skills of effective project management.

Taught by

Hope Forstenzer

Reviews

4.6 rating, based on 12 Class Central reviews

Start your review of Project Management for Designers

  • Anonymous
    All Session of Project Management for Designers with example are very good..

    Panning & execution & customer need is clear from this Session..

  • Anonymous
    Program is god for Panning & execution for Project,
    To understand the Clint (customer) need & full fill the same with using program management
    some difficulty to understand the pronunciation but over all course is very good
  • Anonymous
    An excellent project that once helped me develop quite well in a certain direction. Thanks to these courses I began to feel more confident at work.
  • Profile image for Thais G
    Thais G
    Interesting subject to be taken by designers, the course has a lot of short videos with a lot of content to be learned. There are also assignments to be done, however Im taking as free learner so I dont have access to the exercises evaluation but it does seems to be very good.
  • Vikas Desai
    The basics of project management for designers is very good online course material , from this we understand the clients’ needs & to ensure a project runs smoothly from the beginning & milestones and deadlines & effective time management..

    Vikas Desai
  • Sunil K Rajurkar
    Program is god for Panning & execution for Project,

    To understand the Clint (customer) need & full fill the same with using program management

    some difficulty to understand the pronunciation but over all course is very good
  • Anonymous
    Program is god for Panning & execution for Project,

    To understand the Clint (customer) need & full fill the same with using program management

    some difficulty to understand the pronunciation but over all course is very good
  • Mahendra Sondkar
    Able to learn the Project management discipline of initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing the work of a team to achieve specified goal as per project timelines & within given constraints

    Mahendra Sondkar
  • Anonymous
    Very good class. Pretty thorough breakdown of all aspect of project management. Interesting assignments - some were too short. Not quite as advanced as I would have liked.
  • Anonymous
    The content was valuable for something new to project management. I agree that the course could be a bit more rigorous. Seemed more like a lecture series.
  • The content was valuable for something new to project management. Expert suggestion/explanation are very good, it is very difficult to understand topic.
  • Gouthaman

Never Stop Learning.

Get personalized course recommendations, track subjects and courses with reminders, and more.

Someone learning on their laptop while sitting on the floor.