1:1 Projects - Best Practices

I have recently been utilizing the 1:1 project feature for my peers and had a couple minor suggestions for people getting started with it. I will use my 1:1 project with our Sales and Account Manager as an example:

:one: Create different sections within the 1:1 to break out the areas of focus for the individual. We use Account Management, SaaS renewals, Sales Related, and Miscellaneous as our foundation

:two: Whenever a task is assigned to the individual in another project, add that task to the 1:1 project as well. This can streamline efficiency and have multiple “views” of the task within the customer’s project, as well as the individual’s 1:1 project. You can streamline even more by utilizing rules to automatically add anything assigned to the individual to the 1:1 project

:three: Utilize your integrations as much as possible! Choose from Teams, Slack, Jira, and others to connect your work and keep all of the individual’s work in one spot. We currently use Jira, Teams, and Salesforce to keep our sales manager’s tasks connected across the board.

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@Mike_Tammaro do you have a visual example of this? Im not sure if I am familiar with the 1:1 project feature, but it sounds super helpful!

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A couple of quick points for those not entirely familiar with Asana’s 1:1 feature:

Mike showed peer usage of a 1:1 project but it’s also for use between you and your reports, or between you and who you report to.

Also, re:

I think the 1:1 feature is addressed at a higher level, so while this may work well in your instances, it may not for many others because there may be many tasks multi-homed and overwhelm the intended nature of this project/feature. An alternative could be to share your My Tasks with these individuals and optionally have a 1:1 project as well.

Thanks,

Larry

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Hi @Christine_Andrews

You can click on your teammate’s icon or go to their profile and a button will appear with “Create 1:1 project”


image

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When creating a 1:1 project there are three options presented as shown below, including peers which is why I included it

I agree, just adding my 2 cents. Could be helpful to some not all

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Thanks for the correction, @Mike_Tammaro, and sorry; I shouldn’t have gone on memory alone! I updated my post above slightly to reflect availability for all three use cases.

Larry

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Oh awesome, thanks @Mike_Tammaro ! Very kewl I was not familiar with that feature!

No problem @lpb. Was trying to find out if plans differed as there is not a ton of information on 1:1’s. Hopefully it’s something that can be fleshed out more in the future.

Appreciate the feedback

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Some clients I work with multihome tasks from projects they are working with that they want to discuss at their 1:1 into the project in advance of the meeting so that everything is connected and then they remove it from the 1:1 project once discussed.

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I’ve also created a board for Meeting Notes, where new tasks have the “$Date: calendar invite title” as the title, with a due date of the meeting’s actual date. Any agendas items and meeting minutes are captured in the description. Take aways / follow up items are captured as a subtask. The only downside to that subtask approach is that you can’t also add it to a relevant active project).

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@anon60619778, Just fyi, are you aware that a subtask can be added to projects? Just do Tab+P or use the Task Detail overflow menu.

Larry

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Well look at that… Thanks for the tip :slight_smile:

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Hi Mike,

Thanks for the tips!

I have a question, is there a reason why you use the 1:1 to keep all the individuals tasks and not the My Tasks tab?

Hi @anon40881798

It’s not so much to manage all their tasks in the 1:1 project, but as a check-in on their assigned projects once or twice a week.

I’m the designated project manager at my company, so being able to have a 1:1 with each of my peers allows a structured agenda every time we meet.

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Can you give more specific examples or share a template

Hi Reed:

Personalized templates aren’t supported for 1:1 projects at this moment. I have provided a screenshot of an example I have with one of my peers. I have redacted sensitive information, but you can get a general idea.

Essentially, I utilize 1:1 projects as a check-in function to ensure my team and I are aligned. They all own many projects and even with Asana’s organization, even the most organized person can get cluttered.

I will multihome these tasks to their assigned projects as well so nothing is forgotten as well.

Hope this helps

@Mike_Tammaro or anyone else:

We’d like to have some kind of snapshot of an employee’s progress as of the 1:1 meeting. Currently, this is a Word document that contains much of the content in the Asana 1:1 project, but putting it in Word (or a PDF) makes it static so the employee and manager can “sign off” and commit to doing what was promised. And then we can later go back and look at it, and potentially use it to remediate performance issues if needed, or celebrate everything we got done.

Is there a better way to do this using the 1:1 project (or some other function) in Asana?

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Hey Dan,

Why not use the status update feature within the project. When you - or your team member submits a status update, that becomes a static snapshot and you can both comment on it together as a sign of acknowledgement (unless an employee signature is a must).

You can agree on certain milestones or certain calendar dates in the year when the status update is provided and that becomes your baseline for progress.

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@Mike_Tammaro I think it is great you are highlighting this feature.

I have been using the 1:1 feature for my meetings with my old manager, and just moving to a new line manager thinking about whether it is a good idea to start a new one as often the old 1:1 project was a bit static.

Great to see your ideas on how it could be more versatile and interactive across the different projects you are working on and I will 100% be trying out some of your tips, though would be interested in more tips on development ideas and getting them into 1:1s if anyone has any?

Is the 1:1 Projects feature documented anywhere? I noticed it does a few things that are unique to 1:1 Projects (such as creating tasks to get ready for the meeting).