Tools of the Trade: All-Access Review of Asana

It was a 1.5 years of slow adoption of the tool. We started slow and gradually adopted Asana into our workflow. And in 2018, we're making it the central nervous system more than ever.

I grew to love this tool as we gain more confidence working with it. We get to know it better the more we use it. And so I want to talk to you about the things I love and hate in this project management tool.

10 things I really like about Asana
1. Board view great for content projects

If you're familiar with Trello, then you'll know what boards and cards are. A board has columns that you can attach cards to. You'll move the cards across or within the column as the project progresses.

I love the board view, it's clean and works great for content projects which have stages. Each stage will be a column, and each content piece will be a card.

2. List view for our step-based projects

You can do a list view if you have projects that are based on steps.

We used this view when we produced our Agency Jumpstart Course. We start by defining all the steps needed to produce the course. We work through the project and checked off tasks.

The list view is great for complex, one-off projects that need to progress chronologically. The board view is more suited for ongoing projects like producing articles for our blog post.

3. Calendar view of entire team projects

You can also do a calendar view.

This view shows you what's happening everyday within the team. But more importantly, you can see how busy each of your team members are. The tasks they're working on, and whether they're completing their tasks or having a backlog of unfinished tasks.

4. Keep meeting notes and assign tasks

Here's a cool tip for using Asana in meetings. We keep meeting notes and assigned tasks during the meeting right within Asana.

We start with scheduling the meeting, and then building out the meeting agenda in Asana. We'll talk through the agenda and identify who should do what. We'll discuss the due dates for when the tasks should be completed. So we're building and assigning tasks and due dates as we go along.

We use this method to inform and update team members who were not present at the meeting. We also do it to create reminders for team members, i.e. to share something they're working on.

This helps us to not let things slip through the cracks. If you say "yes, I'll do that" but didn't write it down, and if you're going from one meeting to another, things can easily slip through the cracks.

But if we assign names and due dates right away, the task/ reminder will show up in task list, and there's more accountability. This has helped me countless times and has worked really well for our team.

5. Tag tasks to easy organization

Tagging makes it easy to find things.

We do tagging for our 90 day challenge. As we have a different type of content for each day of the week, our tags reflects this.

By clicking on the tag, you can see everything with that tag.

6. Bulk edit due dates

You can bulk edit due dates by selecting multiple tasks and changing the date just once.

We build buffer in our schedules to accommodate for

For example, due to an emergency, I wouldn't be able to complete the 4 tasks on Monday. I'll select all 4 of the tasks and move them to Wednesday. It helps that we've built bugger in our schedules to accommodate for small shifts like this. With this nifty trick, I'll be able to keep honest with the team with the schedule.

7. Integrated time tracking available

If you want to do time tracking, you can put it right into Asana. You can track how much time is needed for the tasks and will be use that information to plan and manage resources for future projects.

Tracking time also lets you know what it's profitable and what's not, and you can do that right within Asana.

8.Integrates with Zapier – 1,000+ Zaps!

Asana also integrates with Zapier, which is one of my favorite tools of all time.

With this integration, the possibilities are endless with what action happens in your business. Zapier allows Asana to communicate with 1,000+ apps, with limitless

9. Tons of App Integrations

On top of the Zapier integration, there are many native app integrations in Asana as well.

There's an app directory that you can search and tap into all these native apps. We've used many of these integrations to connect different apps in our business. It really works well for us.

10. Easily attach files to projects

You can attach files to your projects from any online drive.

When we produce video-based content, we'll attach raw and in-progress video files in Asana. Team members will be able to quickly identify the files related, instead of ploughing through Dropbox folders to find it.

[JasonDove-bdvx]

Been using it for years. It's stunning & utterly simple.

[brendanklem]

Seeing how a real person uses a software vs just a demo from the company is invaluable! Tools of the trade are insanely valuable from Jeffalytics. Thanks, Jeff!