Asana to the Rescue!

I thought about writing a drawn-out, comparison-based post about my experiences with project management software, but this seems like a better idea:

asana_snag

That’s right. Stack Dog fully endorses (and chews on) Asana! This is NOT to be taken lightly, folks, because I am queen of “eh, I don’t need to make a list.” I really struggle to justify the use of time for to-do lists when I’m pretty good at prioritizing/executing without any sort of reminder. I’ve been told, “Oh, you just don’t have enough things to do,” which I find to be hysterical. My personal secret is an amazing guilt pattern; I can make anyone’s request seem as though an innocent puppy will be slaughtered mercilessly should I dare forget about doing it. Despite my stubborn tendency to adopt these tools, I listened to a fellow programming colleague and tried Asana.

Yay for simplicity with a smart twist! You can fire up Asana in minutes with a Google account and have a running project list shortly after that. The nice part, too, is you can quickly share your project with someone without them seeing all of your projects/tasks. That right there is what won me over; I can essentially move annoying, convoluted email threads out of my inbox and into an organized, constructive layout while allowing my clients to comment/add tasks as they please. You can even upload files/images as needed, which helps for drafting and designing processes. Again, it’s all rather simple and light, but intuitive with the purpose of crossing things off and collaborating to get things done.

Previously to Asana, I have worked with Basecamp, Zendesk, Jira, etc. and they all have their own wonderful traits. The only issue is they can quickly become a nightmare for people like me who just want to jot something down and show that it has been crossed out. Those platforms are so robust and extremely customizable, but you can lose hours to data entry about something that, frankly, you should just be working on right now. Yes, there is a great payoff in the form of amazing analytics and visuals for your projects, which can translate to an improved process in the future, buuuuuut it sometimes eclipses the project itself. Plus, some of the bigger software are simply lacking that intuitive flair and therefor cannot be quickly shared with a less-than-savvy client. Asana rocks the socks in that department. Seriously, try it out and share a project with your [insert technologically incapable family member here]; you’ll hear the pause as they start to ask a question because they realized they figured it out. It’s a lovely moment.

So, again, if you’re all “I-hate-lists-but-I-think-I-need-to-be-more-organized”, then go here now. You can come back and yell at me if you don’t see what I mean.

Happy coding!

 

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