Our new Practical Guide title, Managing Web Projects by Breandán Knowlton, launched yesterday and we’ve been blown away by the response. We’ve already received tweets and emails from people to say they were getting stuck into their digital copies, while others are waiting excitedly for their paperback copy to ship.

Seeing a book come to life is just as exciting for us as it is for customers. Yes, we’ve seen chapters, we’ve proofread and we’ve edited, but the content – and ideas – is in the author’s hands. We wait, just like you, to get our hands on the final copy and pore over it at the first chance we get.

So for me, as studio and production manager at Mark Boulton Design and Five Simple Steps, getting hold of a copy of Breandán’s book was like an early Christmas present. It’s a book for people like me. But it’s also for people who aren’t project managers; it goes further that that. This is a book for everyone who works on web projects.

“Good project management is all about making sure that you and your team have a better time doing something that you love.”

In Managing Web Projects you’ll find a comprehensive guide to every stage of a typical web project. You’ll learn tried and tested techniques for getting the most out of meetings, pick up tips on working with content, look at stages of design such as wireframing and prototyping, and find information to prepare you and your team for the later stages of integrating your project.

“Looking back over your project and seeing accurately what worked and what didn’t is just as important as looking forward to a new project and making accurate predictions.”

Among my favourite chapters in this book are the final two, ‘So, did we win?’ and ‘Now what?’, covering the valuable but sometimes forgotten area of what to do once a project is complete. Was it a success, did some aspects take longer than expected, did some things fail and have to be changed along the way? Breandán suggests practical ways to pull out information that will help make your next projects even better.

This is already one of my favourite Practical Guides. Whether you’re a project manager, designer or site editor there is something practical in this book that will guarantee you success in the next project you tackle. But don’t just take my word for it, pick up a copy today and find out.