Forum Discussion
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Apr 18, 2017How do you use Planner?
With the https://medium.com/@mansoor.malik/a-few-updates-to-planner-integration-in-microsoft-teams-6e9683d1e085 to Planner, my small team has leaned in and made it our project management tool of choi...
Brent Ellis
Apr 18, 2017Silver Contributor
We have approached Planner strictly as a Group tool, rather than Groups as a by product of a Plan. (We arent considering Teams at this point).
It is much easier for our users to digest Groups as a collaboration-in-a-box product, with multiple workloads (including a Plan), than provisioning them a plan and them asking why the heck did I get all the rest of this stuff, I just wanted a Plan.
We primarily have things organized (1) Workgroups, (2) Project Groups, (3) Organizational Groups. Each of these traditionally would try to do action items in SharePoint lists, and they are diving into Planner with lots of excitement because it is way better than SharePoint lists.
Some (lets call them old school) users it has taken a little bit of getting used to, especially if they have never used a tool like Trello or Wunderlist before, but the learning curve is pretty small IMO. The views and charts make analyzing what they are actually doing (or not doing) way easier than it ever was in SharePoint task lists.
We are struggling in some ways for more complex use cases, because some users have also discovered Trello around the same time, and the biggest feature now missing from Planner is the ability to email in to auto-create a task. So we are trying to head that off at the pass, but Planner has got to catch up in some basic functionality areas to achieve parity with their 3rd party competitors, and as others have mentioned in these forums, progress has been slow going.
It is much easier for our users to digest Groups as a collaboration-in-a-box product, with multiple workloads (including a Plan), than provisioning them a plan and them asking why the heck did I get all the rest of this stuff, I just wanted a Plan.
We primarily have things organized (1) Workgroups, (2) Project Groups, (3) Organizational Groups. Each of these traditionally would try to do action items in SharePoint lists, and they are diving into Planner with lots of excitement because it is way better than SharePoint lists.
Some (lets call them old school) users it has taken a little bit of getting used to, especially if they have never used a tool like Trello or Wunderlist before, but the learning curve is pretty small IMO. The views and charts make analyzing what they are actually doing (or not doing) way easier than it ever was in SharePoint task lists.
We are struggling in some ways for more complex use cases, because some users have also discovered Trello around the same time, and the biggest feature now missing from Planner is the ability to email in to auto-create a task. So we are trying to head that off at the pass, but Planner has got to catch up in some basic functionality areas to achieve parity with their 3rd party competitors, and as others have mentioned in these forums, progress has been slow going.
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Apr 19, 2017Hi, Brent! I can't agree with you more. Planner does need to catch up to some 3rd party app functionality. Trello's integration with slack is incredible, and I'd love to see that level between Teams and Planner.
You also said,
Brent Ellis wrote:
We primarily have things organized (1) Workgroups, (2) Project Groups, (3) Organizational Groups. Each of these traditionally would try to do action items in SharePoint lists, and they are diving into Planner with lots of excitement because it is way better than SharePoint lists.
I think this is key. I'm on a small team, here at AvePoint, which is a sub-unit of a larger department. While, I've ended up in several Groups and several Teams, I feel like it is easier for me to get information if it is divided up in the same heirarchy as my company is. I would hate to go dig for some project-based, ad hoc team.