Workload - Introduce the ability to give different weight to tasks

[Matthew_Taylor1]

Hello,

I love the idea of the workload add-on, and since my agency is deeply ingrained in the Asana platform, I was excited to implement. Upon further review, I saw that essentially “all tasks are created the same” as far as their impact on a resource schedule. If I have 1 task that will take 16 hours, I want to see that 1 task fill two days of capacity, where as right now it will just look like that person has plenty of open time over those two days. This unfortunately is preventing me from signing us up for this tool.

When might an actual workload/task level of effort capability be included in this feature? If that is done well and soon, we will definitely be adding Workload to our mix!

Thank you

[Bastien_Siebman]

From what I know a task weight is indeed on the roadmap

[jlenhart]

Agree. Not useful without weight.
Also- need to be able to sort or filter both by person and by project.

[lpb]

@Matthew_Taylor1, See this post to sign up for the beta of effort-based Workload:

Workload: Now rolling out to Asana Business and Enterprise users

Hi there! I’m excited to announce that we’re rolling out Workload—Asana’s take on resource management—this week! Workload provides a visual snapshot of your team’s work and capacity across projects in your portfolios. We’ve heard from many Business and Enterprise customers that they needed this centralized view to be able to see staffing across multiple initiatives at a higher level. We want to thank our Asana customers who have provided so much crucial feedback during the beta period; this he…

Larry

[Marie]

Hi folks and thanks @Matthew_Taylor1 for raising this question!

Like @Bastien_Siebman already mentioned, our Team is already working on implementing different weight for task in Workload. While I don’t have a precise Timeline to share just yet, we’re hoping to launch this new feature later this summer.

And if you want to have early access to these new options, you can sign up for our Beta here!

Hope this helps!

[Josh_Noble]

We use a number of different ways of weighting tasks such as percentage of time available, hours per day, total hours over a period of time and points for larger scale sprint based projects.

Do you know the plans for tackling the weighting of tasks in workload?

[Marie]

These are definitely options we’re looking at, but I’ll make sure to loop you in when I have more precise information @Josh_Noble

[RichK]

Hi @Marie, what’s the update on timing for this? It shows as available in the AsanaGuide here, but it’s not available in my instance. We are trialing Business namely for this feature and would love to demonstrate it’s potential value to my team! Thanks!

[Josh_Noble]

@Marie do you have any update on the weighting of tasks in workload? I’d especially like to be able to set effort based on a percentage of someone’s capacity eg 50% over 2 weeks.

[Derek_Christensen]

This is exactly what my team needs. Someone is assigned to a project at 50% until it’s done, whether that is 2 weeks, 5 weeks, or 10 weeks. The current solution requires a lot of quick math calculations, and then if the project extends by a week, needs to be recalculated.

[Bastien_Siebman]

can’t you use the existing possibility to use a custom field instead of the task number to count workload?

[Derek_Christensen]

We are currently using the custom effort field for hours. 1 week = 40, 2 weeks = 80, 3 weeks = 120, etc.

We tend to allocate people by percentage time over a duration. In tools like 10,000 ft, I can say “Manisha is 75% dedicated to Project A for 2 weeks.” If the project extends beyond the 2 weeks, I update the end date and the allocation continues.

In Asana, the effort is fixed. To allocate someone at 75% for 2 weeks I need to calculate 80*.75 = 60. Then, if I change the end date to be 3 weeks, it drops the allocation down to 20 hours/wk, or 50% of time, so I have to re-calculate and re-enter the new effort.