Tips for using Trello’s new personal productivity features as a team
We take a look at Trello’s new personal productivity features, and how you can make the most of them for collaborating with your team in Trello.
We’re super excited about Trello’s latest feature release, which includes two cool new tools: an inbox list for capturing tasks from outside Trello, and a planner for scheduling your to-dos.
These features are designed with personal productivity in mind (and are definitely a great way for each person in your team to better manage their tasks!) – but how can teams harness these new tools for better collaboration, too?
In this article, we take a look at how to layer Trello’s new productivity tools with Email for Trello and your existing shared inbox workflow.
Your shared inbox in Trello
Trello is a powerful platform, not just for individual organization, but for working as a team.
The Email for Trello Power-Up takes this one step further, so that your team can share the load when it comes to email and email-related tasks. By connecting a team email address (like help@ or sales@) to your Trello board, a shared Trello inbox helps to:
Improve visibility. A shared inbox in Trello centralizes your emails, making it easy for your team to collaborate.
Boost efficiency. Each email becomes a Trello card that can be assigned, discussed, and tracked.
Automate workflows. Set up rules to forward emails, assign tasks, and add labels or due dates automatically.
💡 TIP Find out more about how to connect a shared email inbox to Trello (even if you’re using Gmail or Outlook).
Trello’s new features for your shared inbox
Let’s take a closer look at how Trello’s new personal productivity features come into play in a shared inbox environment.
Planner
If your team works together in a shared Trello inbox, the planner feature is a helpful way to improve this collaboration even further.
Adding a shared calendar to your existing shared inbox workflow means everyone can see the team schedule – whether that’s for upcoming bookings, sales meetings or project deadlines.
Add a shared calendar to your Trello planner, so that you can view and add to your team’s schedule.
💡 NOTE If you add a calendar that’s associated with a shared email address, everyone in your team will have to add that calendar to their planner manually in order to have shared visibility. This is because the calendar you add to your planner is only visible to you by default.
Task inbox
Trello’s task inbox feature is a useful way to capture work from wherever it arises. But it’s not a replacement for a shared email inbox in Trello, because the new Trello inbox list is connected only to your account, and is not visible to others in your workspace.
It works like a holding area for your personal to-dos and is available across all the boards you belong to in a Trello workspace. All the cards in your Trello task inbox list are individual to you – until you move them into a board.
This is still super-helpful for truly collaborative working. For example, in a help desk scenario (or for other teams that rely on round-robin style working), it does not matter where the work comes from, but rather that anyone can add tasks to the shared workflow.
Drag cards from your personal task inbox, into your shared inbox board in Trello.
Here are a few more examples showing how the new Trello task inbox can make collaboration more seamless:
Add any points arising from in-person conversations to your Trello inbox list (via app or Siri), and move those cards into your team’s workflow as needed. Great for project managers and HR officers.
If you get requests for work via Slack, keep track of them in your Trello inbox list and make sure they get seen to by the right team – whether that’s eCommerce, marketing, or reservations.
If a client sends an email to your personal email address that would be better dealt with by another team (like sales or accounts), simply forward that message to your Trello inbox list and drag it into the correct board.
The new Trello – for your team
Trello’s personal productivity release is an exciting addition to an already powerful platform. The new planner and task inbox features are not only a great way to boost personal productivity within your team – but can also be used to enhance everyone’s shared inbox experience and improve collaboration across your Trello workspace.
