Clickup Project Management Overivew
There are tons of bells and whistles in ClickUp, but for now, I want to show you how to do 3 things:
Find your tasks
Manage communications within your tasks
Handoff tasks to other team members for review
Ground Rules..
Before we get started on the Clickup General Overview, here are a few general ground rules:
Under no circumstances are you to create a task or modify any estimates on any task. If something doesn't look right or you can't find a task, please talk to your project lead. All tasks are tied to estimates and budgets and should not be altered.
Do not delete any tasks. If you find a duplicate, please let us know.
Do not close any task for any reason. You may move a task to the DONE status, but you are not to close out ANY tasks unless you are a project manager or team lead.
Now... let's jump in.
You'll probably get a million and a half notifications. And sure, there's a few handy tools to help you manage your tasks within Clickup, but honestly we want to keep it simple so that you aren't distracted trying to figure out Clickup.
So... the only place you will need to EVER go to find a task here.
Everything Board
So this is where our SPRINT board is. Simply put, every task in every workspace is assigned to a sprint. Any task that must be started, worked on, or completed is on that board for the sprint week. If your task is missing on the sprint board, please contact your team lead. Do not search for tasks because sometimes old or closed tasks pop up that are not the right task for that week.
Board Statuses
As you scroll right to left, you will notice that there are multiple lanes or columns. These are synonymous with our task statuses which you will see when we dive into the tasks.
Here is a breakdown of what each status means:
Open is the status that we use as we start to collect information about the task. It’s not ready to be acted on yet. Once the task has all information and is ready to be worked on, we move it to the queue.
In Queue is the status where tasks go when things are ready to be worked on. Your tasks that are due for the day or within the next 48 hours will be queued up for you to work on in the order of priority and due date.
In progress, means that the task will be started, worked on, or completed that day. Monitoring this status allows leads to ensure that we are able to complete time-sensitive projects on time, and that the team is working on the right things. If ClickUp isn’t optimized properly, the team can easily work on the wrong things which can affect your timelines negatively.
Blocked is the status that you move a task to that is time sensitive and supposed to be worked on, but you're not able to for some reason (missing logins, lack of access, etc) Make sure that you notify someone in Slack as well that you are blocked so that they can help you unblock that task as quickly as possible.
Team Review is the status that leads review daily for all departments so that we can quickly approve and move things along.
On hold is used when something requires no action for now. We sometimes use this status for buckets of time, where there isn't a need for a status per-se, but we need to be able to track time for it during the week/month. (ex. Monthly ads management)
Done status is used when we want to get the task off of the board, and remove the time from our Box View, but not archive it just yet.
Only managers can mark things as complete. This ensures that all items have been checked (for example… source files are collected, time is logged, and all subtasks and checklist items have been addressed, etc), before archiving the task.
Tasks... and how to handle them
Now, let's press on to the fun part... tasks!
Here are the various parts of a task:
Status - Simply put, this is where the status of the task is managed. As you can see, it matches the statuses on the board. Every client related project has the same statuses. If you click the status, you can choose which status you want to assign to the task. If you push the little carrot, it will automatically assign the task to the next status. If you press the green checkmark, it marks the task as closed. (Don't do that!)
Timer - Be sure to use THIS timer. Not the one that's crossed out. Can't stress this enough. Or else your time won't show up in the right places for payout and budget management. If you need to edit your time, you can click the three dots to adjust your timer. Please note that 85% of time needs to use the TIMER. Excessive use of manual entrys will be flagged, and are grounds for termination. We will send warnings if we see a pattern of excessive manual entries. If you must manually enter time on a task, let a lead know if for some reason there was a tech malfunction. (It happens from time to time, so we don't want to penalize you).
Do NOT edit the estimate under any circumstances. Please?Assignee - This is who the task is assigned to. There should be only ONE person assigned to a task. There are very few extenuating circumstances where multiple people would be assigned to a task. If you are assigned to a task, your are responsible for all steps of the completion of that portion of the task. Be sure to heed any and all checklist items associated with the task.
Priority
Our tasks all have a priority and can be sorted by priority on our boards. This should help you determine at glance which tasks should be worked on or completed first.Red: Urgent - These tasks need to be completed first and are due within 24 hours and is... well... urgent! This task is either overdue or a 911.
Orange: High - These tasks are high in priority and need to be completed next. Either in 24 hours or within the next day. These tasks tend to be in danger of being overdue.
Blue: Normal -These tasks are due as assigned and must be completed on-time. Do not move these tasks due dates as they have been communicated to the client already.
Grey: Low - These tasks are low priority, and if the due date needs to be moved, we can do so once we confirm the new dates with the client.
Clear: No priority - Clients with no priority are typically backlog tasks only. All tasks should have a priority.
Estimate - This indicates how much total time everyone on the project has to complete the task. We want to complete all tasks on-time and under budget. Under no circumstances are you to go over budget on a task. If you are in danger of going over budget, please let your lead know so that we can approve, or get additional time approved from the client.
Start Date > Due Date - This indicates when we are supposed to start a task, and when a task is due for completion. Under no circumstances should we be completing tasks late. Late completion needs to be communicated to the client BEFORE the task is late. Please let your lead know if a task is in danger of being late.
Total time - This indicates how much time has been logged on this task.
Guru Card - If there is documentation on the process or processes of a task, it will be linked there.
Sprint - This is the SPRINT label that we use so that the task shows up on the sprint board. The sprint label will have an 's' followed by a 4 digit number. The first two numbers are the year, and the second two are the week that the task is to be worked on or due for the week of the month. Sometimes there will be multiple sprint labels on a task. That's okay! If a task is not showing up on the sprint board, it is usually because we don't have the sprint label setup properly.
Deliverable - If there is a template or a doc where the work must be turned in, it will be linked here under deliverable. (ex. monthly or weekly reports)
Lead - The task lead/project lead will be indicated here. You will tag them in comments to review your work once it is complete. They are authorized to engage with the client and approve edits and such. Reference this field if you are not sure who should be QAing your work.
Comments - This is where you will provide feedback on this task. More on that later.
One other are that didn't get tagged is the description area. This area will hold many details about the task. So be sure to reference that area for task information.
Handing off tasks
To avoid confusion, this is how we hand tasks off to one another, ask for feedback, etc.
Assigning a Comment
Assigning a comment is the proper way to assign a portion of a task to someone else, ask for feedback, or handoff a portion of a task to someone else (ex. QA an email). Simply put, there are a few ways to assign a comment someone:
You can use a forward slash command (/ac @someones-name)
You can click the assign task button right under the comment section.
If you accidentally forget to assign a comment (maybe you tagged someone instead... you can tell because there will be a checkbox underneath it and the comment will show up on the right as a checklist item if it is assigned), you can click the assign button on the comment to assign it to someone.
Assigned comments will show up on the board, and will show up on someones list of tasks when they click the ME button on the board.
The ME button reduces all of the noise on the board so that you ONLY see your items. Neat, huh?
Whew... almost done.
Completing tasks
When a task is complete, move it to team review. If a task needs to be reviewed by a client, move it to client review. If a task is done done, go ahead and move it to the DONE status. This removes the time for completion in the box/workload view, and triggers a lead to review it before it is closed. BEFORE completing tasks, make sure that the task has all of the source files in the task, any fonts, etc.