The other day I did something that felt a bit weird in Asana. I was notified by an internal service we have (called Asana Pulse) that my partner had a lot of overdue tasks. I knew he was a bit behind on managing things, so I decided to go ahead and help him.
I went to see his My Tasks view and ordered it by due date. I tried to deal with as many overdue tasks as possible.
For some tasks, I simply took over and did the work. For other tasks I went to his email account (we share credentials) and analyzed answers he was waiting for and updated the Asana task. For other tasks, I even went ahead and sent email reminders to partners or clients on his behalf.
It felt awesome and weird at the same time. But I really believe in this approach and think this is something we should be aiming for: trust between partners to be able to take over when needed.
What do you think?
PS: if you sort someone else’s My Tasks view, it sorts it for them as well
I am the lone project manager at my company and this happens more often than not. The team does well with communication via email/meetings but sometimes forgets to mark off a task that the email or meeting occurred.
Going through their tasks is helpful for project completion and takes work off their plate during the day.
Yes! This should be the standard in small teams. This his how we work as well.
The prerequisite for this is a strong, smart, communicative team with above average skill levels.
My assistant has started doing this for me, and at first I felt a little violated, but then when I looked at My Tasks and saw how many overdue things she was able to clear out for me, I felt so much better. Now I encourage her to do that when she’s light on work.
I clean up tasks for my team and I sometimes take on their tasks but I often counsel my team (read direct reports) not to do this for each other without a conversation. I think that this approach robs a person of an opportunity to prioritize, ask for help , or communicate what a reasonable workload is with me. Once we’ve talked we might reorganize tasks but then it can reduce the likelihood of ending up in this spot a week later.
I think that makes sense. There might be context or nuance to the task which is not sufficiently represented in Asana, that a conversation would surface.
Yes makes alot of sense and actually Asana has triggered this dynamic in my teams since some years. As we have many common and interdependent goals, the teams tend to use Asana to see if anyone is behind and support those team members. I see Asana as an enabler for this attitude and behavior more than anything. Big lever is the visibility that Asana brings across the team. Without visibility, difficult to spot such situations as sometimes people will be reluctant to declare they are losing the control on their backlog.
Also interesting we had a customer testimony (will not disclose the Company) at an Asana event in Amsterdam couple of years ago which was using Asana fully to support their journey to become fully Holacratic Company whilst also practicing GTD (Getting Things Done). So the idea was actually that Asana helped them conclude collectively all tasks within a team each and every day without depending supervisor or manager to trigger this. The idea to support the collective daily goal, even if tasks were assigned to other person was high on their agenda. Again Asana was proving to be an enabler for them on this aspect thanks to overall visibility of work to be done.
The other day I did something that felt a bit weird in Asana. I was notified by an internal service we have (called Asana Pulse) that my partner had a lot of overdue tasks. I knew he was a bit behind on managing things, so I decided to go ahead and help him.
I went to see his My Tasks view and ordered it by due date. I tried to deal with as many overdue tasks as possible.
For some tasks, I simply took over and did the work. For other tasks I went to his email account (we share credentials) and analyzed answers he was waiting for and updated the Asana task. For other tasks, I even went ahead and sent email reminders to partners or clients on his behalf.
It felt awesome and weird at the same time. But I really believe in this approach and think this is something we should be aiming for: trust between partners to be able to take over when needed.
