Asana Rolls Out New Project List View to Increase Clarity Around Project Tasks and Misses the Mark With Customers
To improve visibility into progress on project tasks and navigate the details of project plans, Asana has rolled out a new project List view. However, while the feature enhancement was supposed to make life easier for project managers, many users have commented that the “sections” functionality has changed, and as a result, has caused organizations a lot of grief.
The new List view introduced changes that let users do the following:
- Search and find key project information such as assignees and due dates.
- Customize project view with up to 20 custom field columns that allow you to keep important information in sight.
- View subtask and comment count at the project level.
Other updates include:
- Improved CSV importer that automatically maps spreadsheet columns to fields in Asana.
- Increased subtask visibility – no more clicking into a task, now you can see the number of subtasks within a task from the List view.
- Inbox filters that allow staff to choose what notifications they want to receive.
- Refresh to the IOS app to make it easier to find necessary information.
However, Asana’s customers don’t seem to be excited about the changes. Numerous comments have been made around the effects on the “Sections” feature, following this change. “Sections” are no longer sharable between projects; this has left users with sections sitting idle, unable to be completed. Customers claim that task numbering is now isolated by section, which limits communication for a team that is handling a larger list of projects. Others are complaining about the pain of deleting “Sections,” which now requires that all sub-tasks be individually deleted before the entire section can be deleted.
Are you using Asana? Tell us about your experience.
Source: Asana at SoftwareReviews, Accessed December 4, 2019
Source: SoftwareReviews Project Management, Report Published November 2019
Our Take
A key function of project management is to feed the portfolio through clear and consistent reporting. This new functionality in Asana can be beneficial for organizing tasks at the project level, however, true success should be measured by how easily this information can help support decision making at the portfolio level. It is important with any type of reporting that maintainability is favored over granularity. While it might be tempting to get very granular with the time allocation and work assignments at the project level, remember to always balance the value with effort required to maintain the data. Unsure of where to start? Determine the seven dimensions of resource management to make better use of your commercial PM and PPM tools.
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