Get To Done®: The Essentials
Get To Done®: The Essentials
Posted in Help Articles, Productivity | 3 minute read
You’re ready to take on a new project management system, and you’ve chosen Get To Done. Congratulations! You’re an intuitive person, but what is an Epic? How do I move Tasks? What’s the best way to use Get To Done to save time and organize my team?
You might feel like Dorothy whispering to Toto that you’re not in Kansas anymore, but that’s a good thing because you’re about to enter a new world of increased productivity and streamlined project management. So don’t mind the man behind the curtain and start to feel like there’s no place like home with Get To Done.
Menu Navigation - Follow the Yellow Brick Road
Let’s take it from the top! Starting in the upper left-hand corner, you’ll notice several boxes.
FREEZER
The "Freezer" contains epics that are large items that are out of scope.
LATER
"Later" shows you the Epics that are in scope in the Results Backlog. Prioritizing may still need to happen before it can be moved to “Soon”.
SOON
"Soon" displays Stories that are being refined to become Ready for Planning. At any time, you can drag and drop items across columns as needed.
NOW
"Now" shows Work In Progress (WIP) broken down into Tasks To Do, Doing, and Done. You can drag items across the columns as you get to Done.
Epics, Stories, and Tasks - Oh My!
Although the names suggest the size and scope of a project’s breakdown, let’s make it even clearer.
- An Epic is a Backlog item that is too complex for the team to tackle on their own. It needs Stories, which you can view in “Soon,”
- A Story is a unit of work that is small enough to be agreed upon by the team.
- Tasks are undivided chunks of work that can be completed by one or several team members. You can see these clearly in the “Now” section and move them to the Done column when completed.
To see how they are broken down, take a look at the image below.
Create a Story - But Not Once Upon a Time
You’re not writing a novel, but you are creating a narrative for your project. Follow these steps, ruby slippers not required:
1. Go to the “Soon” section of the board by navigating to it at the top left-hand corner of the screen.
2. Click on the blue-bordered box with a plus sign in the middle.
3. Here you create the Story in the current view by giving it a title, description, goal for what Done looks like, and assign team members to work on this Story.
- The Story Owner is the person taking responsibility for the Stakeholder’s interest in the project from planning through completion.
- The Coordinator is the person who is going to organize the team.
- You can select the Story Dev Members who will be actually completing the work.
- Then you can add other information, including the due date and a reminder.
4. The Story gets added to the “Soon” column for further review and then Tasks are assigned and agreed upon. Stay tuned for Essentials Part 2 to learn more about Tasks.
Before you can click your heels three times, you’ll be saving time and feeling productive with this easy-to-use tool. No more wishing for courage because you’ve got the brains and your team has the heart. Great shoes wouldn’t hurt, but that’s not part of this happily ever after.