Most of us don’t fancy deadlines and consider them as a burden and perpetual pressure. But for any organization to function smoothly and achieve targets, deadlines are crucial and cannot be avoided.
Meeting deadlines need not be stressful or nerve-racking if you follow these simple steps:

Take the Deadline Seriously
Many people are very casual and unmindful about deadlines. This will lead to disastrous results later on. Deadlines are assigned with a goal in mind and must be accepted, taken seriously and adhered to.

Document the Deadlines and keep Reminders
Making a list of projects with their corresponding deadlines and checking back often will be a great way to be on schedule.
Gantt chart is a very effective visual scheduling and communication tool where you can organize your project tasks and deadlines, track and communicate their progress to the team. A simpler option will be your wall or desk calendar to keep track of key dates. Even the calendar application on your mobile phone will do the job.
There is plenty of productivity software that you can use to organize your information. These can store names, contact details, research data, and folders of important documents and files.

Delegate Smaller Tasks
If you are managing a big project, make sure to delegate tasks to members of the team according to their skills. This ensures the deadlines are met, employees are recognized, and at the same time motivate them to be more productive.

Break Down the Project into Smaller Tasks and Give a Timeline
This is an obvious step of any project implementation-“divide and rule. Breaking the project down into smaller tasks and making the deadlines into milestones makes it appear less overwhelming. A deadline for each deliverable sounds more achievable than one for the whole project. This also helps to keep the team on track with the deadline and no one is heavily laden with work towards the end.

Only Concentrate on the Task at Hand
To make the most of the time available and maintain the right momentum of the project, it is best to focus all attention only on the current task at hand and check it off when complete. Contemplating about the future will add no value to the project.

Set a Premature Deadline for the Team
A study from the Journal of Consumer Research says that more ahead the deadlines are, more motivated the people are to work. Further the deadline, they tend to procrastinate.Always be prepared for Murphy’s Law to take effect as at least a 20% change in scope is inevitable in most projects.
The project manager must also give some slack for his team members for any emergencies. This can be achieved by setting a soft deadline for his team. This cushion deadline period can be anywhere from 2 to 5 days.

Ensure that Deadline is Realistic
It is foolish to set oneself up for failure. If you think the deadline for any project is not workable, try negotiating for a more practical due date. It is wise to be aware of one’s competency than to fall short of expectations when it is too late.

Finally, Stay Organized
The importance of efficiently managing time in any project cannot be stressed enough. An elaborate project with multiple deadlines is hard to keep up with without planning and organization. There are plenty of Time Management tools and Software that can help in date tracking and document management.
Tools such as Slack can be used for centralized communication that can be based on topic, project, or team. All company and project data can be located easily without going through long chains of emails.

Asana is a tracking tool that helps you to structure your work, set the deadlines and prioritize, all from one place.

Expiry calendar app Aladdinpro helps you with document renewal reminders on the go, to your mobile as push notifications and to your email. It also allows you to collaborate and work in groups to stay connected with your team even when on the move.