Forum Discussion
assigning tasks to volunteers
I am to create a system for us to assign tasks to volunteers (volunteers that could be inside or outside the organization, depending on what is the best practice). But I have no idea how to create this functionality in a smooth way ...
Preferably everything happens in SPO and Outlook.
This is only a draft of the ideas I have. Any improvements are appreciated :)
- Employees create a task. A notification is sent to all volunteers.
- A volunteer picks up the task and works on it. The employee (and the other volunteers?) gets a notification. Maybe that if no one picks up the task, another notification is sent.
- Typically, the volunteer's work consists in creating and editing Word files. There maybe should be a place to store files connected to the task, or maybe the employee and the volunteer could share files in Onedrive.
- It would be great if discussions about the task could take place in the same environment, rather than in e-mails.
- When the volunteer uploads a Word file, or marks the task as completed, the employee gets a notification. It should be possible for the employee to "re-open" a completed task.
(BTW, "tasks" is not necessarily what SPO calls "tasks", it is just the word I use)
You could setup the issue tracking App in SharePoint and create a workflow to alert every one of the new case. There is also a Tasks App in SharePoint that is the same as Tasks in Outlook 2013/2016 that might work also.
- Thanks, would there be conversations or file uploading capabilities in that setup?
Issue tracking does have comments for a easy reply. I dont believe tasks does. The person would have to edit the task to post more info. You might be able to add the feature though. Id test both and see what you like more.
- I recommend you to check Planner...it could really fits your needs...the downside is that Planner does not support Guests yet (it's in the roadmap)
Seems like Planner does support Guests now - at least half the way. I am testing Planner, and added an yahoo-e-mail address. I recieved an invitation to the yahho, could log in ... but it is not possible to reach the "Planner part" of Planner (tasks.office.com); all the yahoo user gets is e-mails and document library, and some confusing web pages. If I haven't misunderstood something, I think I will create organization accounts for the volunteers. That is, if I find that Planner is the best solution.
Since Planner uses SharePoint for storage and possibly the planner itself, Id look into seeing if you can turn on External Users from the SharePoint site. Might work then, i think its off by default. I started using it recently too.
- Thanks, I will definitely check out Planner. My thought in the first place was to somehow connect lists and tasks and workflows ... but Planner maybe does it better?
