How best to fulfil a large, intricate and wide-ranging project involving many people?

First remember that people differ in how they like to be informed. Some prefer to see the whole picture first of all and somehow assimilate everything into this. Only when they have managed this can they get down to the details.

Others will be put off by the scale of the undertaking and will instantly decide that it is not possible. These are best given the briefest of overviews – in long range idealistic terms – and then moved straight into smaller tasks.

In all cases, though, for a large project to be successful it needs to be broken down into pieces small enough to be realistically achievable.

Someone needs to take an overall view – in larger organisations this is often a ‘steering committee’ – and then the individual projects going towards the whole need to be managed separately. The roles may be shared in a small organisation but they still need to be done.

Any large project needs time and concentration so use your virtual office receptionists to achieve this. They will take calls and pass messages on to you subsequently. The virtual office will also give you an address which could be particularly useful if the project details need to be kept apart from any other business.

With time and attention devoted to the overview and the detailed planning the project should be successfully achieved no matter how long the timescale. Be sure to break your project into small digestible chunks.