The Productivity Benefits of Trello

Trello is a fantastic productivity tool with collaboration benefits, in both free and paid versions. It’s a fantastic way to manage projects and communicate with other team members (cutting down on the number of emails, as well, if you set it up that way, of course).

Trello consists of Boards, Lists, and Cards. 

A Trello board is the main platform, where you’ll find Lists and Cards inside.

A list can be designated as a project or a deadline, and cards are added to lists, as a visual breakdown of what needs to be done in order to complete the project.

By inviting members to your board via email, you can easily collaborate with various team members by assigning cards to specific members. Simply click on the Invite button at the top of your board and insert email addresses.

Decide on how you would like to set up your board. Will it be by the project? Date? Deadline? Or will you assign a list to each team member? It could even be as simple as To Do, Doing and Done.

Once you’ve created a list, you can add a description to it, defining what the purpose is for the list, or adding specific instructions, including links, images or documents.

Add members to the card (once they’ve accepted your invitation to the board), by clicking on Members or the ‘@’ symbol, and selecting the member(s).

Setting up labels is a terrific way to colour code assignments within the board. You may choose a label for each team member, or each project.

A checklist is a great way to break down large projects into smaller, more manageable tasks. Even copy a list over from another document (this works best if you have one task per line), Trello will populate your checklist accordingly.

Add a deadline to each card by clicking on Dates. You’ll even be able to set a time, if necessary.

Power-Ups are add-on features that can allow you to add a calendar system (or choose from many other helpful additions). With the free version, you’re allowed to have one Power-Up, but if you upgrade, you’ll be able to add more.

There are many add-ons you can use with Trello, such as Slack, Toggl, Outlook, Dropbox, Google Drive, and more. You can even set up ‘email-to-board’, and add things to a Trello list right from your inbox. If you use Gmail, be sure to try out the Trello-Gmail extension!

Trello works well with other systems such as Zapier and IFTTT, which are a great way to automate systems you’ve set up!

If you would like to have virtual support in your business, please do get in touch.  Drop me a message on shirley@virtualofficebox.com 

Shirley