Katie sent me the link a couple days ago that cloud / browser-based PM Software Asana – a personal favorite of mine – is finally including task dependencies. I even scheduled out social media updates via Hootsuite to spread my joy. I did a happy dance. I picked up my dog, Lily, and twirled her around – she might still be dizzy from it.
Then I went to go play with it
And didn’t find how to do it. There wasn’t a listing in my dashboard.
So I went and researched
And that’s when my heart sank sort of:
Asana is making task dependencies a paid Premium Feature. That means freemium users like myself, who don’t need to hand out accounts to more than 15 people at the moment, don’t get access to the feature.
If I would have read the whole blog post, I would have known that.
“Task dependencies is available only to Asana Premium customers. Upgrading to Premium gives you access to more members and more powerful features. Learn more about Asana Premium or contact our sales team for more information.” – blog.asana.com
WORKAROUND UPDATE: Some free users got the beta invite
Katie tells me she got it for free because she signed up to do the research surveys. So, guess what I’m doing? That’s right, I’m signing up to be a beta tester. Here’s the link. I’m really hoping they pick me.
But I can’t get mad at them
They’re not the only ones who do that. Wrike does the same thing at this time:
“Dependencies and Date Constraints on the Timeline View
“The Timeline View is available to all users on all paid accounts.”
Basecamp doesn’t even offer task dependencies:
“Basecamp does not support hierarchal to-do lists, sub tasks, or dependencies. Basecamp lists are simple one-level lists.” – help.basecamp.com
And, “yes”, I know there are other systems out there but these are the three I know – unless you want to include project.net which I haven’t used in almost a decade, though it was was pretty bad-ass at the time. It’s how I cut my teeth on PM systems. Then it bogged down when we inundated it with psds and pdfs. But, none of my insight on it is any value anymore because of how long it’s been since I used it.
And I have been eyeing Microsoft Project for down the road. I remember hearing good things about it. But, I don’t need more today than I have.
And, yes, there are PM apps in Google with task dependencies. I’ve played with them but, again, not in a while. And when I did, their UX was a it nauseating.
What’s the big deal about task dependencies
As I write this, I’m starting to convince myself to go back and check out those Google Apps, again…
Actually, I probably won’t check. I have a bit of a love-affair with Asana that even my love affair with Google can’t mess with, unless those apps come with a mobile app…then again. I’M SO CONFUSED!
Why? Because Task dependencies are conditional tasks in project management software systems that reminds you that in order to do your task, a previous task needs to be finish. Like, for example, if you want to launch an email campaign but don’t have your boss’s approval, you can set conditional tasks to where your email launch is conditional on your boss approving it. The boss finishes their task, THEN you finish yours. Everything is documented. Everything is emailed in updates so everything is CYA.
You get piece of mine. You get order flow without the panicked headache of trying to remember whether or not something needs to be done. You also get redundancies because once the conditional task is ready to go, you get an email. Less time worrying, more time scurrying to finish the tasks at hand.
All in all, it is a pretty incredible feature. If you haven’t tried them, don’t, unless you’re prepared to become dependent upon them. :-D.
Time to mark this task off in Asana.