How many times have you sat down with a client to discuss a project, then later the headache starts to come and you wish it would all go away? How could I let this happen you're thinking. So you said you'd deliver on time and your a little overdue, that can be compromised. Not delivering what a client expects, neither party wants that outcome. There are a few things we can do to avoid these disasters, a project if planned correctly will never fail.

Consider these steps to ensure that your project is not a failure:

1. Planning. Every project needs to be planned, even more so if it involves members of a team or group. Otherwise nobody would know what to do or who was doing what. So it is the project coordinator's job to sit down and get his team together to get the work under way. An overall discussion of the project is presented and each member should make his own set of notes as guidelines to his involvement in the project.
2. Assignment. Each member gets assigned the tasks they need to complete for the project. This tasks and only general there are no specifics in detail, it is up to him to come up with the solution and present it to the project coordinator for approval or modification. The client doesn't need to know the specifics of how the project works, but it must provide him with all the information he needs for him to achieve his tasks.
3. Documentation. Ideally the project should be documented, then approved by the client as conformity. This should be detailed as much as possible and clear for anybody who is looking at it. Each member of the team should provide the necesary documentation in relation to what his role in the project is in order for it to be complete.
4. Design & Programming. Two important things although very different they must work together as a team.Now you may think to yourself, the designer doesn't need to know how the code works for his design, but the programmer need to code for the design, right? Well wrong! A programmer doesn't care what the design look likes, if you want to know how many apples are on a tree, do you really care what the tree looks like? Neither need to know what the other looks like or how it works. They must accomplish the task described in the documentation. If that is not the case, then that is failure.
5. Development. The project gets underway with everybody doing their tasks at hand. It is recommended you always allow yourself thet little extra development time just in case un forseen issues should occur, and you don't wanna delay not only your own work but the later stages of the project. 
6. Implementation. With all the pieces to the puzzle in the box, whos gonna glue it together? As I mentioned before "TEAM", everyone participates in one way or another. usually the programmer gets to grips with it first, the designer can then tidy up the mess. The project coordinator always needs to be on hand with his team and keeping close contact during development stage.
7. Testing. The pieces are all glued and it's looking great but does it actually work or are there any broken pieces? It is important to provide the Testing period and make the client aware of this period. Ideally say your project was planned for completion in 8 weeks, that last week would be your Testing period. So you don't want your client kept in the dark any longer, provide him access to test it himself, make clear to him it is not the final release and any bugs found during that period would be corrected.
8. Completion. The day has come, the project is finished. The final release is being handed over to your client. He is happy, he has everything he asked for, it works for him, he knows he has your support behind him should any issues arise and you provided everything within the agreement before the project began.

Some other notes you should consider when building projects is that these may want to grow at some point. A client could come back to you a month or so later and say, can you add this on for me or could you make it do this that and the other. We both know what answer the client is expecting, baring in mind it is a reasonable request. If you was to build a robot dog that walks and barks, the client says he would now like it to lay down or sit. A well planned project would allow you to implement this additions quickly and effectively.

Every team member has his own points of view regarding the way a task can be done, it's not a context of who can do it better but what is best the the project.

Send me your feedback of successful tips you have on project planning and management.