What is the hardest and most stressful part of remodeling your bathroom?

Is it the plumbing or the tiling or the painting? Perhaps it's the electrical work that's most difficult, or the physical aspect of removing and refitting large items like bathtubs and toilets? Well I think that the most difficult and stressful part of any home improvement or remodeling project is something else entirely…

Project management of a bathroom-remodeling project is the most stressful job.

You probably think that designing your new bathroom and selecting all the wonderful things you want to go into it is difficult. You are right, it is but it's nowhere near as difficult as managing the project as it progresses day to day.

Why is project management such a problem?

Project management is about developing and carrying out a plan that will take your dream design into spectacular reality in the shortest time possible. When there are many contractors involved in the job, or I should say many individuals involved in the job, formulating a plan that might work is difficult enough as it is. Keeping the job on track and to the plan as it progresses is far more difficult.

There is more information about managing the stress of bathroom remodeling in the article Supervisor Stress - Bathroom Remodeling

First create a project plan

To create a project plan you first identify all the tasks that need to be done like stripping the old bathroom, fitting the new one, building work, tiling, plumbing, electrics etc. Then you work out any dependencies between the tasks like the fixtures must be in place before the tiling can start. Then you put all the tasks on a timeline showing the duration of the task and when it should start and finish. The correct name for a plan like this is a Gantt chart and should impress your contractors when you pull it out in front of them.

Keeping your bathroom remodeling project on plan

This is the difficult part and can take up a lot of your time if you are going to do the job properly and keep the project on track. All would be well of course if nothing ever went wrong but it will. I've been involved with the project management of many projects and my mantra is this "If it can go wrong then it probably will". Something will go wrong at some point you can bet on it.

So how do you keep the project on plan when things go wrong?

Try to anticipate problems that might arise before they happen and try to have an alternative plan ready. For instance you might want to keep in touch with the contract firm that you didn't give the job to just in case your first choice drops out or one of the workers falls ill. Try to locate more than one source for your fixtures just in case your supplier fails to deliver. Make sure that you know how to hire drying equipment at short notice in case you get a flood.

The most important aspect to keeping a project on track is to anticipate and deal with problems before they arise but if you can't do that then the next best thing is to react to problems quickly and efficiently.

At the end of the day project managing your bathroom remodeling job is a full time job and if you want to avoid the stress that it brings then you should hire someone to project manage for you. It may be more expensive but a lot better for your health.