List of upcoming Asana features would save users time & increase Asana sales

Asana needs a project roadmap like the one Teamwork has. This has benefits such as:

  • Current and prospective users don’t have to keep wasting time asking about whether a certain feature will be added. And Asana community managers can stop answering the same questions over and over.

  • Right now Asana drop hints on what they’re going to work on. Like they will say in one blog comment that they are “looking into” a feature or say in forums that they are making something a priority. These comments are then passed around among users and the end result of this telephone game is super inaccurate information. You end up with people expecting features that maybe you didn’t even promise because you are releasing your information in such a piecemeal and ad hoc manner.

  • You would increase sales if prospective buyers know that the key feature they want is in the works. For example, I really liked Teamwork’s ability to switch between Board and List view. But I held off on switching to Asana because Asana couldn’t do that. However, after hours of research I finally found some comments stating that Asana is working on this. Most people don’t have the patience I do to do this kind of research. You could’ve easily lost someone like me as a customer because you didn’t clearly tell us a key feature is coming.

  • Knowing what features are coming will cut down on the amount of time your customers are investing in workarounds in Asana. For example, right now I’m experimenting with lots of different workaround ideas to make up for the fact that Asana doesn’t have folders. It is taking hours of research and will probably take hours of implementation. However, if I knew Asana is working on this then maybe I wouldn’t have to waste time doing this.

  • This forum here is filled with dedicated Asana fans who want what is best for Asana. If you give us a roadmap we can then stop wasting time asking for features already on the list, and the hours freed up can be used to discuss more nuanced and helpful ways to use Asana.

Here are some objections Asana may have to this idea:

  • We don’t want people to complain about missed deadlines That’s understandable. And that’s why Teamwork’s roadmap has no due dates. It simply tells us what stage of the development it is in.

  • We want the flexibility to abandon projects that’s not working If you have a proper public roadmap, you would get much more insightful input on requested features. This would result in you working ONLY on things that people REALLY want. So while I can’t guarantee every project will work, at the very least you know all projects you work on are real top priorities for customers.

  • We don’t want competitors to know what we’re doing Asana’s competitive advantage isn’t your ideas. It’s your implementation of those ideas. Wrike and Teamwork are much more “sophisticated” products in terms of features offered. What Asans offers is your beautiful and thoughtful UI. Even if Wrike and Teamwork get a hold of your feature priorities they still can’t duplicate you. Because they really really a different kind of design philosophy for a different type of audience.

  • We don’t want to disappoint people Yes there will always be complainers who will criticize your plan. But just because you don’t have a roadmap doesn’t mean they are not complaining. They are simply not complaining to YOU – they are complaining to other users and potential users and you don’t even know it.

  • We’ve done fine with the current system You are wasting the time of your dedicated community managers, forcing them to answer same questions over and over again. You are creating uncertainty among current users and confusion among prospective buyers.

By the way I agree with you that deadlines should not be posted. Just a list of upcoming features and the stage of development they’re in would be fine.

@Crane29 agree totally. Great post :slight_smile:

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Yes, yes, yes! The product roadmap seems like such a basic thing and would go a long way showing some user-base love.

https://forum.asana.com/t/roadmap-for-asana/393/13?u=tompar

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+10 for this idea. Thank you @Crane29 for taking the time to provide such a detailed and (in my opinion) important summary of the issue. Let’s see what Asana thinks about it. :wink:

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Agreed, 100%

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Hey @Alexis! Are there any news on this? :wink:

I think this is a great idea!

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