Task Lists Archives - Darryn Van Hout

Are You Getting The Best Out Of Your Task Management Software

Darryn Van Hout — Fri, 20 Jan 2023 21:59:40 +0000

If you’ve ever had to manage projects, people and everything in between, chances are you have to sift through countless task management software and each one has its own features and functions.

Without a doubt, the best task management software should be up and running in seconds, enable countless integration, import and sync with ease, ensure complete customisation and help you manage your projects in one place.

Project managers need task management software that support their project planning, assists in completing tasks and making quick checks of assigned tasks. The user should also be able to easily view and filter task lists, reprioritise tasks and view what’s next in line.

A single project can have many tasks to be completed, some concurrently while others may require the support of teams to meticulously complete it within expected timeframes.

Luckily (for today’s managers), there is a plethora of task management tools to consider. To help you avoid wallowing in the ocean of options, it’s best to examine a small set of task management software that meets your business needs, analysing key reviews to enable you hit a bulls-eye option the very first time.

The Ultimate Guide to Task Management Software
Finding The Best Task Management Tools on the Market
The Deep Dive Into Task Management
Project Management vs. Task Management
Most Reliable Technology For Managing Tasks
Facilitating Task Management
Effective Management of Your Team’s Tasks
Understanding Your Task Management Tools & Software
Tracking Tasks Using Management Software Features
How To Update Task Lists?
Can I Share Task Lists?
How To Save Time With the Right Task Management Software?
Choosing a Task Management Software

The Ultimate Guide to Task Management Software

Ask any seasoned project manager and they will tell you that working on a new project can sometimes seem like climbing a high mountain. Hence, the most effective way to handle such a project would be to cut it out into a string of tasks.

Being able to manage everyone’s tasks in the project is what helps project managers to remain relevant and effective in completing projects on time.

The most critical part of managing projects is simply task management. Basically, task management refers to the colossal to-do lists of every job that must be completed.

This often becomes overwhelming when handling the more complex projects that feature high volume tasks and numerous work streams.

Thankfully, there are countless digital solutions designed to streamline management of tasks.

Finding The Best Task Management Tools on the Market

In the past few decades, the task management software market has significantly evolved. If you have a small business, you may require a simple tool to help you run your project even on a slim budget.

Conversely, enterprises Project Management Offices need more scalable and robust solutions. No matter the size of your business, there’s an all-in-one task management solution for you.

While majority of solutions on our list tick all the boxes for what the best task management software must have, they are not entirely free but have trail versions for a given number of days to enable project managers to try them out.

The Deep Dive Into Task Management

Task management is a term that describes the way project managers handle tasks through the project’s life cycle which includes planning, analysing, assessment and reports on the progress of individual tasks.

Following the project step by step enables managers to closely monitor their projects at every stage from start to finish, ensuring successful completion.

Huge projects can be broken down into a sequence of tasks that will see a project completed within the expected time frame. Hence, task management is a crucial part of your project management.

While theoretically the term task management simply refers to the long task list of every component of the project, this methodology might not be ideal for managing multifaceted projects with varied workloads.

Fortunately, in this time and era digital solutions are readily available and easy to outsource. Whether you’re looking for support, advice or guidance in effectively handling your projects, or software to help you achieve your targets, the system is a click away.

Here, you’ll get valuable information about task management solutions. Use this guide to find everything you need to learn about task management.

Project Management vs. Task Management

The words “project” and “task” management are intertwined and can sometimes be confusing. Yet, they are quite different.

Basically, tasks refer to a unit of any given job, and task management involves managing every aspect of a single task. Projects come with timelines for each individual task. Hence managing projects encompasses the management of all tasks in a project.

Project management and task management apps are closely related and are interchangeably used to describe tools, though the main difference between project and task management software is in their comparative scope.

Essentially, a task management tool is basically a to-do list that allows users to store and systemise tasks. Based on how complex a tool is, the software may also incorporate various features for due dates, prioritisation, alerts, assignments and attachment of files, though these may be unnecessary.

Project management apps are designed to sort and track numerous tasks, sub-tasks, communications and documents needed to run and successfully complete projects.

These apps can also create several programs and projects, assign tasks or sub-tasks, distribute resources, share files and evaluate data points.

Most Reliable Technology For Managing Tasks

Task management apps help project teams to effectively manage their tasks. If you’re not proactive, you could be working reactively and that can be quite unproductive.

You can’t work and accomplish a lot efficiently if you were more reactive to your last email, call or message you received.

Effective management of the project at task levels enables people to continually prioritise their work and save time on having to figure out the next task and when it should begin.

This is crucial considering the many distractions in this time and age. Regardless of how focused, dedicated, diligent and enthusiastic about completing your projects successfully, even the most greatest of us are susceptible to distractions every now and then.

Without reliable task management tools and software, it can be difficult staying abreast with your assignments and ensuring that every team player meets their deadline with consistency.

The use of task management apps comes with several benefits including:

Ability to give highest priorities to tasks in your to-do list.
Being able to view and track the progress of tasks assigned to your teams through the project’s life cycle.
Being able to know the timelines and the available time for completing tasks within the project
Integrating tasks and grouping them for better operational efficiency.
Accessing all tasks any time and from anywhere to evaluate progress.

Facilitating Task Management

Management of tasks becomes faster and quicker when the best tools are used. Whether relying on a simple spreadsheet, sticky notes or complex software, effective task management will be determined by the tools selected.

While you may be familiar and comfortable with using sticky notes or a simple list approach, it becomes difficult to assign and reassign tasks, group similar tasks and prioritise them in an excellent order.

But once tasks have changed or shifted, it becomes tricky to update them without wasting time redoing them.

The best task management app will enable you to automate your project’s processes and give you the flexibility to set up and update tasks. This is done by simply listing tasks to be completed by people in the project and adding new tasks or sub-tasks to every item as required.

Moreover, the task management software does more including:

Generate lists of tasks for easy dissemination
Define custom views that simplify projects
Filter tasks based on timeframes of a day, week, or month
Store detailed information of tasks and links to relevant files
Tracking task time against a project’s overall timeline
Drag reports of billed hours for employees including vendors, freelancers and consultants.
Simultaneously manage and access several tasks with some clicks.

Effective Management of Your Team’s Tasks

Project managers should steer to manage projects more effectively as well as each team member’s tasks. While a manager may complete their work on time, the same might not be said about other members of the project.

More often than not, project managers waste time following up other team members to find out their progress, even when the assignment is scheduled and what needs to be done.

With task management software and applications, project managers can save lots of resources. When an action is taken during a meeting, a manager will only need to make a note and add the same to the task management tool.

The project manager will then assign the task to the rightful team player and this will automatically reflect in their own to-do lists. This enables team members to easily access and be immediately responsible for their workload.

The best part of it is that project managers can easily monitor the progress of teams and see how specific tasks on the project are proceeding.

Moreover, they can filter tasks within the project based on available resources and check on what each team member is working on and their workload, with a single glance. Project managers can send team members reminders about an impending deadline.

To-do lists in task management software are usually connected with the resource reporting feature, and this allows managers to see how the workload is distributed.

Furthermore, project managers can be able to determine whether the work is evenly spread out or not. This saves time and reduces duplication of tasks as it helps to reprioritise and reallocate resources as per the need.

Understanding Your Task Management Tools & Software

Once you’re signed in, you’ll be able to view available tasks and work allocated to each team member in a given day or week. The assignments can further be split into separate tasks that a manager can prioritise as the project evolves.

For instance, if your access is limited to a resource or team member during early morning, be sure to front-load every task assigned to them so that it may be tackled at the required time.

When you click on a task, you can view comprehensive details of any assignment. Sometimes, a manager can add notes and hyperlinks, update task status and upload task files.

Everything required for the project for a given day or week will appear at one place accompanied with visual reminders of what should be done and by whom.

The software will then highlight in red any overdue assignments. This comes in handy in helping to identify and place urgent tasks on your to-do list on top or change the expected task completion time.

The best task management software will also enable you to schedule notifications or get an email at a specific time with pending tasks for that day, the next task to be completed and overdue tasks.

Tracking Tasks Using Management Software Features

Based on your preferred task management software, there may be a column indicating “% Complete”, which shows the team’s progress in the project’s life cycle. Anything above 0% is a clear indication that your project is ongoing, and once the task hits 100%, it should be complete, and you should be moving forward to the next task at peak efficiency.

Team members are allowed to update tasks manually as they continue or the project manager can do the updates during reviews and status updates.

The data provided flows automatically and is reflected in timesheets and the manager’s project dashboard and timelines get updated to reflect the team’s progress and what remains of the project.

How To Update Task Lists?

When teams are busy trying to meet the project’s targets, they can be tempted to procrastinate updating their to-do lists, and project managers can fail to get a true picture of the status of the entire project.

The best way to keep your finger on the pulse of the project and track its progress at every phase is for each team player to update their to-do lists once an item has been successfully completed.

Alternatively, managers will require every team member to update task lists every end of day and mark them off as completed tasks.

Again, a manager can scan through to-do lists for each team member that is yet to be updated and make necessary changes on new input delivered by the member.

An update to the to-do lists is fast and easy, enabling every team member to start their days with a clear overview of pending workloads and what should be prioritised.

Project managers should always spare some few minutes at the end of a day or week to perform updates as team members update their timesheets.

Can I Share To-Do Task Lists?

While task management is more focused on project managers, it becomes more effective when everyone in the team has visibility.

The right task management tool will make it easier for managers to share task lists with everyone on the team. Team members can track progress of project tasks as they zero in to change the status of the items that are linked to them.

To ensure more clarity, managers need to separate their own tasks from project-related tasks, as they should not be shared by other team members.

How To Save Time With the Right Task Management Software?

It’s smart that you ensure optimal productivity every hour you’re at work. Effective management of your tasks and your team’s needs time, but when it is done right, it saves time.

Without the help of great task management software, project managers easily get overwhelmed, miss deadlines, lack clear priority and mismanage teams and resources.

Ignoring useful task management tools can ultimately cost you money, time and make the project even more complex.

Here are top tips to help you save time with your task management app

Tip 1 – Prioritise your workload

With a single, centralised task list for the project can be helpful, though it doesn’t guarantee productivity. Always prioritise your tasks and delineate tasks that are more urgent. With the software, project managers can update the priority and urgency of various tasks on a daily basis with just a click.

Tip 2 – Get organized.

Project managers should stop sending reminders, task lists and meeting action points via emails. Immediately there’ a fresh entry, a manager should quickly update the to-do list, schedule and allocate it to the respective team member. While this seems straightforward, the routine of “touching” an item just once can really help to reduce your cognitive workload.

Tip 3 – Use a real-time calendar.

Your calendar is a very important resource, however if you still use paper to track tasks or a spreadsheet, it’s time to upgrade.

Linking a real time calendar to a task management tool can make it easier and faster to assess your task schedules and track their progress.

In addition, you’ll achieve faster and more spontaneous visibility of your tasks as per day, week or month.

This will help you know beforehand the coming busy days, have enough capacity and when to delegate. As such, you’ll manage your time more effectively, and your teams will have more clarity for the projects.

Tip 4 – Tracking your time.

Time is certainly a precious resource. You can employ timesheets to help you know which tasks take up much of this resource. When you determine where you or your team members spend most of the time during a certain period, it will be easier to give priority where this resource is needed most.

The ability to track time as tasks are completed ultimately saves time when a project manager has to remember precisely what was done, by whom and when. The most accurate way to capture time used is to record it at the time a task is being carried out.

Tip 5 – Less meetings means more work time

To spend lesser time in irrelevant meetings allows you and your teams to spend more time working on your tasks. In any way, who loves those long meetings or chaotic back-to-back days?

Meetings should be left for times when critical decisions are to be made and queries answered, and tasks have to be set up to complete some work outside the team’s expected timelines. Everyone will thank you later.

Choosing a Task Management Software

While the market has numerous task management tools and software to consider, collaborative projects are becoming easier to manage. Fortunately, finding the most ideal tool for your needs is possible. All you need to do is take time to try 3-4 tools before you make a decision.

As you sign up for those free trials, be sure to note down their pros and cons to help you compare and make an informed decision.

Involve your team and let them help you choose the best option, after all, they’ll also be interacting with the software. With this, you’ll wish you got the task management app way before.

Image Source: https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/stress-free-business-woman-office-310940804

The post Are You Getting The Best Out Of Your Task Management Software appeared first on Darryn Van Hout.

Stop Thinking In Tasks And To-Do. Start Thinking Goals And Outcomes

Darryn Van Hout — Sat, 18 Jul 2020 04:12:02 +0000

There’s no doubt that in this time and age, majority of us are bungled with the endless tyranny of to-do lists. Life can sometimes feel like a continuous spiral of demanding tasks we all struggle to complete, and hopelessly end up crossing everything off our to-dos, and it can still feel as though we aren’t reaching the goals we set.

It’s no wonder that self-help books keep piling up on our nightstands and we anxiously click on any efficiency hack that pops up in our feeds.

Over the years, I have helped countless people to get to-dos and tasks completed. And if there’s any useful piece of advice that has made all the difference on how successful people handle work and productivity it’s to: Stop thinking in terms of to-dos and tasks you need to finish—and instead focus on the goals and outcomes you want to achieve.

If it’s in your head – It’s an Idea. When you write that idea down – It becomes a task. By setting a deadline to this, you are transforming the idea to a goal.
Darryn Van Hout

Tasks and to-dos are the major building blocks of any work and the desired productivity, however the outcome is more valuable than a blueprint—it’s actually the more nutrient-packed version of your goal(s).

Ideally, an outcome is simply a goal that tells your story not just to others but also to yourself—and speaks clearly about where we desire to arrive. It’s established on the proven power of visualisation as it encourages us to imagine the end result that we not only perceive but also feel viscerally.

Tech giant’s Google Keep combines technology and personal in-home support to help people to manage obvious tasks like laundry, grocery shopping and dry cleaning services alongside other weekly to-dos and tasks.

However, the outcome the company strives to attain for its clients is the end state they visualise: in that the moment their client walks through the door at the end of a chaotic day they find all their to-dos completed.

While this may sound so simple, it’s an essentially different way of working and envisioning how to get your tasks and to-do lists done. Ticking off as done tasks on your to-do list definitely makes us feel productive. But to be truly productive, we must clearly think about the outcomes we want and design every little thing we have to do in order to achieve them.

Note down the outcomes, not to-dos

That doesn’t mean you should shred all your to-do lists. In essence, your to-do lists are a timeless tool for helping you get things done. Mogul Richard Branson swears by it. Warren Buffet says he narrows his goals down into a manageable list of two and deletes everything else. Jamie Dimon jots down his to-dos on index cards and keeps them inside his pockets. Marc Andreessen says he jots down his to-dos in reverse, writing the things he gets done on an anti-to-do lists.

According to a 2017 LinkedIn Survey, 63% of professionals used daily to-do lists with 11% of these stating that they actually completed everything on the list.

But then, the problem is not with the fact that we write to-do lists with tasks we want done. It’s with the fact that we write down the to-dos we want to accomplish when we should be noting down the outcomes we wish to achieve.

This is the main difference with thinking outcome and not to-dos. Basically, outcomes are suggestive of to-dos and tasks but they help you get rid of the paradox of choice and pile-ups of to-do lists having no hierarchy or context. Through the practice of task-making and repetition, thinking outcome first can deliver greater productivity and a more fulfilling sense of achievement.

Think about your own experience. We all face days that feel so “productive” when we stay focused and cross several things from our to-do lists. Then another day felt unproductive and wondered where the time went. This is exactly what happens when we lose sight of the end result we are looking forward to achieving: we end up losing the true meaning and context of the actions we must take to get there.

But when we have clearly envisioned and have a deeper understanding of our destination, and jot it down to keep it a priority on our mind, we will realise that recovering or reflecting on an exhausting work sprint is as valuable as any action taken towards accomplishing your to-do list.

Pursuing outcomes at work

If thinking about outcomes and designing relevant actions around accomplishing them are imperative to personal productivity, then the ability to have a clear image of an outcome and sharing it widely is essential for collective productivity.

The importance of goal clarity in an organisation’s efforts to achieve goals cannot be over emphasised. Thinking in terms of outcome can help an organisation to clarify and focus on its core mission by compelling it to clearly outline and communicate its goals—especially to those within the organisation.

Another great platform, Adam.ai notes that outcome thinking not only defines the service that the company offers to its customers but also organises how the company works; from quarterly and annual planning to through leadership and initiative. What’s more, individuals can apply it to their respective roles whether they are executive assistants, engineers or even product marketers.

How to adopt goals and outcomes:

Write it down

Once we state our desired outcome from the onset, we jot it down. Whether it’s the overall company goal, results of an important meeting or a monthly target, we articulate it clearly and record the end state we expect to achieve. For instance, “by the end of this month, X percent of our clients should be able to use our in-house service as a utility such as water” or “by the end of this meeting, we should have agreed on the most important action to take regarding the updating of our product.” We note it down for accountability and reference. And when it is an outcome that needs to be pursued over an extended period of time, we clearly restate it at the top of our monthly meetings to help everyone refresh the image in their minds.

Act like an owner

This simply means taking responsibility for our own productivity and how we use the time we have. Outcome thinking dictates you have the same mindset of ownership, empowering every team member to visualise the end state and pool our creativity to choose for ourselves the best way to get there.

Stick to the story

Having a visual picture of an outcome as an end state in your mind and which can be deeply felt is very important in storytelling. Just the way stories imbue our day-to-day lives with meaning, outcomes add momentum and narrative structure to our to-dos and tasks that form our day’s work.

For instance, a software development team can use a narrative mindset that reminds them that their design-develop and deploy process is more than a repetitive task of “clearing tickets”. The ability to envision end-users enjoying an intuitive app from the software development team or the thought of how a single update from the app will empower the operations team, crowns our developers’ tasks with more context and meaning.

Pursuing outcomes in life

Outcomes share a similar narrative power to that which drives businesses to hang their mission statements on their office walls. When there’s a common outcome and same end state that is shared and visualised by all, work generally assumes a common purpose as each task firsts up to one shared mission.

In the long run, altering our mindset from one driven by completion of to-do lists to one focused on outcomes we wish to achieve goes beyond a mere strategy for realising productivity at the workplace. This approach promotes even the most mundane things to be done daily by adding meaning, narrative power and intention to them.

Put it into practice. Start each morning envisioning what you want to accomplish by the end of the day, imagine where you will be and what that will feel like. Write it down. Now you’re set to design your day around accomplishing a sense of productivity and completing far more fulfilment than the mere crossing as done your to-dos.

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