Using Trello – Part 1 – An Overview

The first in a two part series. Here is part 2.

Email, e-meh

Email..

..great for conversations.

Big projects? Not so much.

Re. re. re. re. re. re. what?

If you've ever tried to use email for a complex project you'll probably have bad memories of digging through threads of emails running into the hundreds.

And that's not all. Emails would probably start with a project-related subject, but then veer into unexpected plot-twists involving conversations between characters from another movie entirely.

So when you composed your response much explaining had to be done to re-contextualise the task within the current project status, making the already-epic thread even longer.

And of course each email contained a copy of the entire thread prior to that.

Then finally the placeholder text:

[Message Clipped]

.. would eventually be a call to abort the whole thing and start a spinoff.

But as time went on, the email headed south and became buried under whatever came afterwards.

Unless you had a filter / label / folder system, emails from multiple clients and multiple jobs were all in one list.

Going back and searching that chaos? . . NIGHTMARE

No more email?

No, look, I don't hate email.

When email is kept as a place to discuss work, how the project is going, and for casual talk, email can be an away-from-desk space: the board room, coffee area, watercooler, bar, or nearby diner / eatery / café.

But email is not a good project space, nor really a space at all.

Ok, I did just make an analogy comparing email to various spaces, but what they have in common is the lack of a workspace.

But people work in boardrooms and diners you might point out.

yes.. ok look, I'm going to move on now..

Project Space

A project is a collection of tasks.

In fact a project is a collection of collections of tasks.
Perhaps with each involving different groups of people.

And the tasks of a project are not necessarily happening chronologically in order, or one at a time by priority in linear fashion.

To track each task, you need a space where you and the other team members can see all of them, and what their status is.

A status is a complex thing, however, with a history of discussions and decisions, so you need to be able to drill-down into each task to see what was discussed.

Sound complicated? Not really actually..

Hello Trello..

Trello uses an approach which is such a simple and obvious solution to email's shortcomings that you'll wonder why you hadn't thought of it yourself.

Then you'll realise you probably had thought of it.

And essentially probably use aspects of it in other activities, starting with thinking itself.

..then maybe making a list.

Kanban

Trello, and other similar web applications, base their concept on the Kanban system

It's a scheduling system and concept used by Toyota which developed in the 1940s and 50s.

Today's Kanban-based web applications are a distillation and reworking of - and some have said departure from - the Kanban concept.

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First create your Trello account here.
It's free (or rather you can do everything we need to do with the free account).