Best practices for use Planner in your team
- Thread starter RomanS
- Start date
Great question — yes, I’ve explored this quite a bit.
I actually did a post a while ago on how I use Microsoft Planner as a Kanban board for collaborative work. (Tab added to TEAMS)
Short version of my approach
- Planner = team visibility, not personal GTD
I never use Planner as my personal Next Actions system. It’s strictly for shared commitments and coordination. - One Plan = one project or initiative
Each Planner plan represents a clearly defined project or stream of work, with an explicit outcome. - Buckets = workflow states, not people
I use Kanban-style buckets such as:- Backlog
- Ready
- In progress
- Waiting for
- Done
- Tasks = clearly defined next actions
Every task answers: What is the very next physical action?
If it’s vague, it doesn’t belong in Planner yet. - Assignments = accountability, not reminders
Assigning someone means: they’ve accepted ownership.
For reminders and personal tracking, that lives in the individual’s own system. - Planner ↔ personal system integration
Each team member pulls their assigned tasks into Microsoft To Do (or their tool of choice), preserving GTD integrity while keeping Planner clean and trustworthy. - Weekly team review
Planner really shines during a short weekly review:- What moved?
- What’s stuck?
- What’s waiting on whom?
dylanmo1
Registered
Hello Roman, I use it like this:
I use one Plan and five buckets which are GTD analogue [Inbox, Active (commitment to do), Incubate (commitment to review on a date), Someday/ Maybe (commitment to review with no firm date), Complete.
Then tags and people let us sort / filter easily.
Incubate (with a date) is good for little projects that occur on a long recurring interval (e.g. review and clean out our shared library), or 'sleep on it' for a couple months, because we can't move on it now and it doesn't belong in a weekly review (personal or Team).
Each active project is one card, needs a 'what done looks like' once it is in the Active Projects, e.g. results delivered, report submitted, etc. --> with a due date.
And an almost magic rule: only one name on the card, whomever the owner is (not the only person to contribute, of course)
Many due-dates are self-imposed, so we can move them, but it helps people see the real speed of project completion in real life and avoid overcommitment.
I don't allow 'tasks' or next actions on the card title, but people can use the notes fields liberally as they like. They are counted on to move the project forward with their own system. I haven't imposed GTD on my team but I do say I expect outcomes clear, with a verb / what 'done' looks like. They should review these projects about once a week (preferably before the team meeting) to ensure there is a next action (including a waiting for, for instance). This is in fact something I need to reinforce with the team...once you go down this road it will be a lot of coaching!!
All new things, especially possible new commitments that can affect team resources (which is just about everything, since it can affect me as team leader) that are requested of us are brought through the inbox and the weekly team meeting. Then we can discuss if this is something we as a team will accept to do or decline politely. This actually stops a lot of bad ideas: where we are not the right team, or there is a very quick resolution to the question that they didn't imagine, or in fact it shouldn't be done at all. Easier to say no when I and the rest of the team 'have their back'
I also have planner premium and it's kind of nice for the Gantt view, gives people a visual 'wow' that we are doing a lot of things, and the "Goals' feature, where we can attach projects to larger outcomes -- like company shared goals, or our team goals or values. Planner imposes a max of 10 "Goals" so you have to choose those judiciously, but it's not been a problem for us. That helps us look at all the contributions we make and not at the few things that didn't go right or get done as we imagined.
I use one Plan and five buckets which are GTD analogue [Inbox, Active (commitment to do), Incubate (commitment to review on a date), Someday/ Maybe (commitment to review with no firm date), Complete.
Then tags and people let us sort / filter easily.
Incubate (with a date) is good for little projects that occur on a long recurring interval (e.g. review and clean out our shared library), or 'sleep on it' for a couple months, because we can't move on it now and it doesn't belong in a weekly review (personal or Team).
Each active project is one card, needs a 'what done looks like' once it is in the Active Projects, e.g. results delivered, report submitted, etc. --> with a due date.
And an almost magic rule: only one name on the card, whomever the owner is (not the only person to contribute, of course)
Many due-dates are self-imposed, so we can move them, but it helps people see the real speed of project completion in real life and avoid overcommitment.
I don't allow 'tasks' or next actions on the card title, but people can use the notes fields liberally as they like. They are counted on to move the project forward with their own system. I haven't imposed GTD on my team but I do say I expect outcomes clear, with a verb / what 'done' looks like. They should review these projects about once a week (preferably before the team meeting) to ensure there is a next action (including a waiting for, for instance). This is in fact something I need to reinforce with the team...once you go down this road it will be a lot of coaching!!
All new things, especially possible new commitments that can affect team resources (which is just about everything, since it can affect me as team leader) that are requested of us are brought through the inbox and the weekly team meeting. Then we can discuss if this is something we as a team will accept to do or decline politely. This actually stops a lot of bad ideas: where we are not the right team, or there is a very quick resolution to the question that they didn't imagine, or in fact it shouldn't be done at all. Easier to say no when I and the rest of the team 'have their back'
I also have planner premium and it's kind of nice for the Gantt view, gives people a visual 'wow' that we are doing a lot of things, and the "Goals' feature, where we can attach projects to larger outcomes -- like company shared goals, or our team goals or values. Planner imposes a max of 10 "Goals" so you have to choose those judiciously, but it's not been a problem for us. That helps us look at all the contributions we make and not at the few things that didn't go right or get done as we imagined.