Using Project Management Tools to Work Better Together

(last updated April 6, 2022)

Post-it notes, whiteboards, and spreadsheets can only take your business so far, especially for a remote team like ours.

Don’t get us wrong, those tools have their time and place, but as Growth has grown (and expanded over time zones), so has our need for a more sophisticated project management system.

From a dizzying number of project management tools, we chose Asana for its flexible interface and wide array of features.

Asana has helped our team keep track of deadlines, collaborate with more transparency, and even celebrate projects when they're complete. It's helped us work together more effectively than ever before.

So, in the spirit of giving, we’re sharing our enthusiasm for Asana with you:

• what makes it different
• why we like it, and
• how we’ve made it work for our team.

What is Asana?

Asana is an online tool that helps teams collaborate and manage projects by bringing their work into one central place.

With both web and mobile applications, Asana enables users to access their work from almost anywhere. The tool is highly customizable and offers suggested templates to get your projects up and running with ease.

Unlike other tools, Asana is extremely easy to use and can support an infinite number of workflows.

Adapting Asana for Growth

Asana, just like any other business tool, works best when it’s understood and used regularly by all team members. 

When rolling out Asana for the Growth organization, each team member completed a short Asana tutorial before attending a live team training that included a walkthrough of our Asana workspace.

During the month-long adoption process, we maintained weekly check-ins with the team to exchange feedback and suggestions to improve our collective use of the platform. 

How Our Asana Workspace has Evolved

Our Asana workspace looks different today than it did when it was first adopted. In part, that's due to evolutions within our own processes, but it's also thanks to Asana's new feature launches.

In January 2021, Asana launched the 'Overview' feature which provides space for a project brief and sections for key resources, member roles, milestones, and goal setting.

The standard fields are a great start, but we’ve found that our custom fields are even better and are easy to configure. They give a clear, at-a-glance view of where each deliverable stands. Plus, the Slack integration makes it easy to turn discussions into actionable tasks and stay on top of new assignments.

Our Favorite Features

Ashley, Account Manager: "The ‘My Task’ list is my virtual home base throughout the day. It shows all of my tasks from any projects, and I can easily see what’s on my plate."

Will, Business Development Director: "I count on the rich text hyperlinks for context and quick access!"

Katrina, Project Manager: "Setting dependencies between tasks within projects has been a game-changer. When the first task is completed, the assignee of the next task is automatically notified so they can get straight to work!"

Ross, Designer + Developer: "The feedback tool has made the revision process much smoother. Asana lets users digitally mark up any attachment with notes that are automatically turned into subtasks, which makes tracking changes so much easier.

Ginny Grimsley, Senior Copywriter: "I love that Asana is open and clear for every member of our team. I can drop my work-in-progress Google doc into a subtask, and everyone can check it out and make edits so our marketing assets help as many people as possible with what we offer."

With Asana, no task is too small and no project is too big. To learn more about how we work better together, check out our blog. Or, just ask us! We're right here.