Some things never change. Regardless of your business’ size, industry, sector or purpose, success is going to be twice as challenging if your company is lacking one basic ingredient: team work.
But coordinating your team members can be a tough task – especially when your business starts growing and more people are getting on board.
Luckily, the modern high-tech world has taken care of this issue, developing a variety of tools to help you manage your team and improve collaboration between members.
Today, we are going to talk about one of these tools: Asana.
1. What is Asana?
Asana is a web-based software-as-service, developed with the purpose of improving team collaboration and project management by providing an efficient way to assign and handle tasks.
Asana is designed to reduce significantly the need for e-mail communication between members by creating projects that are easily tracked across the team.
Moreover, you can follow conversations, share attachments, write down notes or comments to your team members, and receive notifications in your inbox regarding tasks or modifications that need your attention; all of these without having to enter in your e-mail inbox at all.
Additionally, the platform does a great job on generating detailed progress reports to make sure that your team is moving in the right direction.
The platform breaks down goals and ideas into actionable tasks that are then assigned to the corresponding team members, and it provides you with a variety of tracking features to make sure that everything is running smoothly.
This intuitive project management tool helps you track project progress, identify blockers, create product roadmaps, improve your marketing campaigns, and execute sales strategies.
2. How do I activate it? Do I need to download anything?
You don’t need to download anything in order to get started with Asana. If you are the one who is going to manage this tool for your team, all you need to do is create an account for you and your team members, and start adding your first tasks and projects.
3. Can I get a certification in Asana? Does it cost anything?
Unfortunately, there isn’t any available certification at the moment, but if you are just getting started with the software, you can take a look at this great guide that the company has published to help you in your journey. It is divided in 3 sections:
- I’m just getting started with Asana
- I’m helping my team learn Asana
- We’re expanding our use of Asana
Additionally, you have a variety of lessons and resources so you can learn the tool’s basics.
4. Asana Rating
FinancesOnline: 9.6 / 10 (13 user reviews overall)
PCMag: 4.5 / 5 (Editor’s Rating: Excelent)
GetApp: 4.31 / 5 (1,931 reviews overall)
G2Crowd: 8.4 / 10 (1,273 reviews overall)
5. What features does the software offer?
Some of the features include the following:
- Tasks – creation and assignment;
- Projects – organizing tasks into boards and lists;
- Sections and columns – customization for better workflow;
- Project templates – pre-made templates for adding new workflows;
- Subtasks – for breaking the task down into smaller tasks;
- Due dates and times for improving efficiency;
- Easy conversion of tasks into projects;
- Attachments from your computer, DropBox, Google Drive, etc;
- Inbox for getting automatic updates;
- Private projects for sensitive work;
- Unlimited dashboards and unlimited projects.
6. What are the pros and cons of Asana?
Pros:
- Task assignment;
- Task completion check;
- Simple and intuitive interface;
- Easy platform navigation;
- Google Chrome extension;
- Reduces e-mail traffic;
- Not saturated with unnecessary features;
- User-friendly;
- Reminders and notifications on deadlines via e-mail;
Cons:
- No project templates available;
- Not possible to add multiple team members into a single task;
- Room for improvement regarding file organization;
- The variety of features can be overwhelming for beginners;
- Free version is limited in features;
- Unable to mass upload tasks;
7. What prices are associated with it?
Asana offers 3 subscription plans:
They include the following features:
Free Plan:
- Unlimited tasks, projects, and conversations;
- Up to 15 team members;
- Basic dashboards;
- Basic Search.
Premium Plan – all features from the Free plan, plus:
- No team member limit;
- Unlimited dashboards;
- Advanced search and reporting;
- Custom fields and Task dependencies;
- Private teams and projects;
- Admin controls;
- Customer success webinars;
- Priority support and SSO.
Enterprise Plan – all features from the Premium plan, plus:
- Managing team members with advanced admin controls;
- Priority support within 2 business hours;
- Strict control over data and security;
- Custom branding.
To additionally consult Pricing, click here.
8. What other tools can I pair with Asana?
The platform offers a variety of third-party integrations for improving business performance:
- DropBox – a file hosting service for attaching files directly to your tasks;
- Slack – a digital workspace for your team; this integration posts updates to your Slack channel when there are changes in Asana.
- Google Chrome – add tasks easily from any web page in Chrome;
- Okta – for accessing Asana with your existing credentials;
- GitHub – you can link your tasks with GitHub for updated code changes;
- Google Drive for file attachments directly to Asana;
- Trackduck – a visual feedback and bug tracking tool for websites;
- Front – lets you add conversations from e-mail and social media;
- Timeneye – time tracking;
To read about the newest integrations offered by the platform, click here or here.
9. What else do I need to know about Asana?
You can get the tool for your iOS or Android device so you can manage your tasks and share updates with your team on the go. Download your apps here.
I hope you enjoyed this article, stay tuned for more!
Ani Miteva
