With the New Year already in full swing, it’s time to get organized. Luckily there are some great tools out there to help you out. If you’re trying to manage your own projects or manage a whole team of folks, adding a task management app to your tool belt can be immensely helpful in increasing productivity.
Here we’ll go over a few of our favorite organization and project management apps and how they compare.
Asana
Asana is at the top of our list for task management. It is ideal for getting your projects organized and staying productive. This team collaboration tool is great at keeping track of workflows and making sure everyone is on the same page for deadlines.
The free version is pretty sufficient for the basics and allows you to create various tasks, assign those tasks to people with due dates, add comments, and include attachments. There also isn’t a limit on the number of tasks you can create or the number of people you can have on board.
Asana is however lacking in a time tracking application, so it’s not quite a full-on project management tool. Though it certainly gets the job done for the standard user.
ClickUp
Clickup is rather similar to Asana. With the ability to generate specific tasks, assign them to team members, and see the status of each task. These tasks can be marked as “in progress” or “resolved” and you can also add a custom status if those two don’t fit the bill.
One cool feature is that team members can set notifications for updates to send at designated times. So for instance, if you need to send a status report at the end of the day during the week, you can set that accordingly. One less thing you have to think about.
It has been said that this tool can be a little feature-heavy and therefore a little cumbersome to set up initially. Though once you’ve got the hang of it, ClickUp is a great tool.
Google Drive
Then, of course, there is Google. Their cloud-based storage functions and sharing features can be awesomely helpful in keeping all kinds of documents in order. Allowing users to create, store, collaborate, and edit documents all in real-time.
One of the biggest perks of Google Drive is how user friendly it is. Even if you’ve never touched a Google Suite tool before, it’s super simple to get started. Plus there is a ton of storage available for no cost. Allowing cloud-based backup of up to 15GB of data so team members don’t have to bog down their computers with copious amounts of files.
Trello
Trello is more of a full-fledged project management tool, featuring time tracking and a highly effective management style. It is loosely designed around the Kanban system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanban_(development) , an organizational principle developed in the ’50s. It breaks a task down into smaller more manageable components.
Utilizing a three-tier system, there are boards, lists, and cards. A project is designated a board and that board then contains a list of tasks which is further broken down into cards. The cards being the smallest unit or tasks for each project.
Due to the nature of this system, Trello can be a little unwieldy for larger projects and is usually best suited for smaller-scale endeavors.
Time to get organized!
We know you’ve got a lot on your plate. Managing a team, or even just your own tasks can take a lot of work. Get back some of your time and sanity by utilizing one of these fine management tools to help you get back to business and stay organized.