No matter how you slice or dice it, project managers encounter plenty of repetitive work when handling their various projects and tasks. With so much time tied up in manual processes, task management quickly turns into a task of its own.
Whether it’s recreating tasks or reassigning duties, projects with similar structures, teams, or timelines require a lot of duplicate actions. But you shouldn’t have to spend that excess time on duplicate work!
That’s why we’re introducing the Teamwork Automations Engine.
Previously, there was no way to automate frequent task actions in the Teamwork List and Table view, or across our other features. With the Automations Engine, we’ve simplified the workflow creation and management process by allowing teams to set up various triggers to avoid repetitive work.
Teamwork Automation Engine glossary of terms
Before we get too deep into setting up automations across some or all of your projects, let’s take a look at the most important terms to know. These definitions will help you understand the automation process more clearly, or at least, it will be a nice refresher.
Trigger - an existing event on Teamwork that results in an action
Action - event that will take place if trigger parameter is met
Conditions - additional parameters in a trigger
Additional action - actions that can be added to a recipe
Template - template for automation with a preset Trigger and Action
Active Automation - automation that is running on the site
How to streamline repetitive work with the Automations Engine
The last thing you want to do is waste your time when you could be using it for more creative and strategic work. Setting up numerous tasks and subtasks that have nearly identical details or that happen on a regular basis can really dig into that time.
So let’s look at how you can instantly save time with Teamwork:
Step 1: Start with our gallery of predefined automation templates or build your own custom automation
To make our automation process as easy as possible, users can select from an assortment of predefined templates that are frequently used. Choosing one of these templates will help you streamline specific repetitive tasks that are most common to your workflow.
These templates help users set up automated workflows for when a task’s priority changes, a tag is added, the person assigned changes, or if the progress or pre-determined estimate goes over. This can set triggers to change or add assignees, task lists, tags, priorities, or notify people once you’ve reached certain criteria.
You have the opportunity to refine or add to a template to better fit your needs. However, you also have the ability to create your own custom automation from scratch, so you can make it as robust or as simple as you want.
Step 2: Determine your most important trigger conditions
Teamwork makes it easy to set up various triggers so that you avoid repetitive and manual work. But before you set up your automation process, it’s important to choose the correct trigger conditions to initiate the corresponding response action – A.K.A. to make the automation actually work!
After selecting your preferred template or custom automation, you’ll need to select the trigger under the When section to control the source trigger that would initiate the next response action. This includes options like:
When the task’s due date changes…
When the task’s start date arrives…
When the task’s priority changes…
When assignees are added…
When a task’s estimated time goes over…
Depending on your selection, you’ll need to choose the condition of the When section. This could be a number of things to choose from within that trigger like the date, priority, assignee, or the project.
Next, you select the action you want to be automatically taken under the Then section once the selected trigger occurs. These actions include options like:
…Then notify people
…Then leave a comment
…Then change assignees
…Then move the task
…Then change the task priority
Whatever you select, you then add in the conditions to make the automated task occur. For example, if you want to have the automation notify someone once a certain task starts, you need to add who will be notified and with what message.
Step 3: Set automation as active, inactive, or duplicate them
Once you’ve built your automation, you can then select whether it’s active or inactive. This makes it simple to turn off and on automations without having to recreate them. Under the Manage section, you can easily make updates or change the automation.
You’ll have a list view detailing your created automations, and from here, you simply click on the three horizontal dots to duplicate your automation. Then the Create automation modal appears, which will let you input any additional projects or updates to the automation.
Start offloading the repetitive and manual work with Teamwork
We get it – project management software can be cumbersome, but at Teamwork, we’re here to make life easier for project managers by cutting out repetitive work. The Teamwork Automations Engine is a great way to save time in the weeds of task creation and management.
And as always, we’d love to hear your feedback. Leave a comment in the comments section below or reach out to us at support@teamwork.com with any questions.