I like the system of having a project manager responsible for the editing / updating the specific project - all other users are comment only. This is easy to set up.
Individuals are responsible for their own task management beyond that.
I believe that if someone has been assigned a task and due date then if they need that changed this is a comment back to the assigner rather than to take it upon themselves to change the project parameters.
Yep, that makes sense. I also almost got to this setup.
Sadly, … We are working with a lot of complex tasks where information needs to be organized. Subtasking is super useful, to just divide tasks into smaller bits while keeping projects tidy.
I thought of a solution, but from here it only goes downhill. Dividing information into several places and makes asana rather messy.
Hey @Vítek_Prchal,
some more thoughts from me:
In the end, nobody is perfect meaning there will always be team members less organized than others. And also not everybody has the same strengths. Meaning you could have an excellent marketing person coming up with a ton of ideas and all are in his head but he might not be that good in structuring all into proper steps and need help with Asana to organize things.
I have experienced this many times. Hence why for new team members we also ask them to take a personality test to find out more about their strengths and weaknesses so we can create an ideal work environment for all.
Now that does not mean that several people won’t have to use Asana it just means nobody can be good at everything. So if somebody is excellent at marketing but needs help with organizing and pushing things through to execute we would rather assign a marketing assistant or a PM to work by their side and ensure things are being done organized instead of just replacing this person for example.
Basic rules everybody has to learn and apply but some people are just very “special cases” I would say that, no matter how much you try, just won’t be able to organize tasks in Asana the way the company might envision.
Not sure how your structure is set up in detail but for me, it always plays a key role to have coordinators responsible for whole projects and teams to ensure that everything is set up nicely and super organized.
Yes might seem like some extra work but to be honest, in the long run, it isn’t because the more organized things are from the start the easier moving forward when you need to pull reports, etc
And then over time things will just fall into place and people apply things automatically.
And as long as key people in the company lead by example in terms of how tasks are created, etc then this will make the whole process much easier.
I feel the same as you. I actually had a call with our rep at asana to discuss this very thing.
As much as they say “its fine”, or “you should train your people” No. It is a product that is geared toward large teams, and there are many alternatives out there that have those features. In fact asana is often poked fun at for being late to the game as far as features go.
The problem I see is, the balance between simplicity, and functionality.
The simplicity of asana is significant better than other options for those who are not tech savvy, but some functionality should still be available to those who are capable, and at a minimum the management.
There really should be team manager roles, and super admin roles.
The more granular control the managers have, the less complicated it has to be for employees.
Asana is what my team is used to, and even though its one of the most expensive options, out there, it still has simplicity, and some functions that make it difficult to switch from.
From what I’ve heard, there is some stuff in the works. good luck.
Wow. I think this is a very good discussion on restricting the team members of doing few things like changing the date and putting coordinators on top of them to monitor things.
Let me share my two cents.
I came from a traditional Project Management Background and then learnt the ropes of Agile Methodology.
Traditional Project Management point of view is what this thread’s pressing concern. Restrict employees to only a set few things, allow them to provide comments. The Project Manager or Coordinator would go ahead and change the dates and other critical items after having discussions with team members.
In Agile Methodology, the Team members to empowered to OWN their tasks and keep them public in a project. They could change the date or any other critical task details, provided it is in their Current SPRINT. They don’t have to ask their Project Manager / Scrum Master to ask for permission.
Like wise, if a Team mate is absent or ill, another team member could take over the task of Absent / ill Team member and S/he won’t be asking / informing Project Manager / Scrum Master. S/he would be updating ASANA, and notifications would be sent to Project Manager / Scrum Master accordingly.
ASANA is built basically on the philosophy of Agile Methodology. It allows for the Team members to change nearly all the fields of tasks, provided if they are in their Project, no matter if it is assigned to them. They could freely comment, change the task critical fields and all the accountability, responsibility rests with the TEAM, Not Individual, like in Traditional Project Management.
So if someone would be coming from a Traditional Project Management Background, they would be in Hard Waters. They would feel, that, hey, this isn’t fair. Everybody can change whatever the hell they want, and nobody will answer anything. They might have to use the method of adding in Coordinators, and adding Notifications which will make their Management way more difficult, but doable.
Once again, I think they are left with either adding in personnel who could coordinate more, manage more, or change people, change culture (which is a very hard thing to do, but worth every minute) and live with what Facebook, SLACK and other Agile companies are benefiting from.
Let me know if you want to build a Bridge between Traditional Project Management and Agile Methodology, and want to solve your organizational problems using ASANA.
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Salman, Khwaja.