Simple daily personal tasks format

I keep trying to find the best format for daily personal tasks, like grocery, house, pets, random to-dos etc. but I’m at a loss.

Do I use board? List? Do I create a separate project for things related to my pets, or do I make one master project and tag pet-related tasks with a “pet” tag?

Overall, I am overwhelmed trying to find a simple workflow. Funny how that works :roll_eyes:

Does anyone have suggestions for a simple personal daily tasks workflow?

I’d say use a list, and create a project for certain things. Like I have a project for “Finance”, “Traveling”, etc.

Then just use the “My Tasks” section. Your daily tasks can be managed there. A while back I used “inbox” and recently, I switched to using “My Tasks” and just create sections within “My Tasks” and it has worked quite well.

It’s tough because there’s no right way, but using today/upcoming/later and the “My Tasks” section has made managing this stuff much easier.

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Thanks for your response. I really don’t understand why I have to manually move tasks in “My Tasks” to “today”, “upcoming” or “later”. If I set a task due in 21 days from now, why doesn’t it automatically move to the “later” section? Alternatively, if I set a task due today, why doesn’t it automatically move to “today” section?

Having to move thee manually is a pain, no?

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It automatically moves from later to upcoming to today based on due date. I think upcoming is if its a week out and if the due date is today, it will move it to today.

You have the My Tasks section not sorted by anything so you just see Today > Upcoming > Later, right?

Not sure about the initial setting it that affects it but I’ve have just gotten into the habit to press “Tab + L” for later “Tab + U” for upcoming and “Tab + Y” for today. Most goes into later and automatically move their way over to “Today” when the due date or start date comes up.

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No, any new task goes under the “new tasks” section and then I must move them to the appropriate “today”, “upcoming”, “later” sections.

For instance if I create a new task with a due date of today, sunday, it will stay in the “new tasks” section and not move to “today” unless I do it manually. Below is a screenshot of my current view. Note there is no “today” section even though there are various tasks due today.

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Yep, they stay in the “New Tasks” until “Today/Upcoming/Later” is marked. So long as they have the blue circle to the right of the due date, they will stay in “New Tasks”.

Once you mark it as Today/Upcoming/Later, it then starts functioning as I explained above. Yes, it’s a bit weird and you can see other threads where people have brought this up:

I have hundreds of tasks with misc due dates and most of which, I just marked as “later” to push them away, out of sight, out of mind. Then as the due date starts approaching, it moves them to “Upcoming” and then “Today” automatically. You can see from my list here, I never marked any of these items as “Today” or “Upcoming”, only “Later” and they are all showing up in their respective area now based on due date:

https://cl.ly/e60f4e02bcd8/Image%202018-09-16%20at%201.33.44%20PM.png

If you’re going to be using this as a to-do list for tasks you need to do very short-term, like today, then you won’t be able to benefit or leverage the “Today/Upcoming/Later” as much. While Asana is incredibly flexible, it’s pretty clear that it is more built for businesses and teams than personal. It works great for me (for personal use), but I use it for those long-term or recurring tasks. E.g. “Collect Phone Bill Payment from X + X + X + X” on a monthly basis.

Here’s a few example suggestions that come to mind:

  1. Create a section and mark it as “Today”, that way you will now have a “task” that keeps the “Today” section showing on that screen. Then when you want to create a new task that is due today, simple click on that section, press “Enter” (which will bring you to the next line and create a new task), and it will be properly assigned to you and in the right section.
  2. Do the same thing for the “Upcoming” section as well. Simply create the new task under the “Upcoming” or “Later” section by clicking the “Section” that you made and pressing “Enter”. Now when you set the “due date”, it will automatically move to “Upcoming/Today” once the due date nears. Though it does not do this immediately, pretty sure it triages it once a day or something, e.g. if you create a task due “today” under the “upcoming” section, it won’t automatically move it to the “today” section

Essentially, every task needs to be marked as “Today/Upcoming/Later” in order for the system to work and move it through the sections automatically. You can do that by either creating the task in the respective Today/Upcoming/Later section by pressing “Enter” on an existing task in that section, by moving it there (dragging), by pressing the “Mark for…” to the right of the task, or by using the shortcuts “Tab + Y/U/L” for Today/Upcoming/Later.

Yes, it’s a bit odd, but using it at mass-scale with a team, I don’t mind it. That’s because when someone randomly assigns a new task to me, my little “alert” for it is that it’s sitting in my “New Tasks” section which I then know to mark it for Today/Upcoming/Later, and I am actually aware of it.

The default My Tasks view may be more built for a shared/company workflow.

Could you possibly try just sorting the “My Tasks” view by “Due Date” and totally ignoring the “Today/Upcoming/Later” functionality of Asana altogether?

https://cl.ly/6f8bf26d2ff0/Image%202018-09-16%20at%201.52.07%20PM.png

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Thanks for this thoughtful and informative reply. Ignoring the today/upcoming/later and sorting by due date is a good suggestion. Now if only I could default the sort to due date :slight_smile:

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You got it!

You can do that simply by selecting “Save View for Everyone” after setting it how you’d like it:

https://cl.ly/42d89f1c94e4/Image%202018-09-16%20at%203.57.46%20PM.png

Cheers!

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You’re a legend—thanks!

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