Possible to create dependencies that will carry over across projects when I copy the project?

Our company offers a monthly subscription product w/3 components:

A. monthly subscription box
B. monthly companion magazine
C. weekly companion webisode show.
-All in separate projects that we duplicate each month, because each component has 30+ tasks, sub-sections, etc.

Three Questions:

  1. I’ve created several dependencies across the 3 monthly projects (we typically have 3-4 projects in progress (1 for each month’s component) for each component, so 9-12 projects on the team at a time. Example: the items for the subscription box needs to be photographed for the magazine, and some of the copy in the magazine is regurgitated/summarized on the webisode.

What is the fastest way for us to “re-hook up” all these inter-project dependencies every month? I started writing a “read me to hook up this project!” at the top of the projects, but project-starter folks are getting bogged down. Heck, I’m getting bogged down. With every copied project having a unique Asana ID, it seems unlikely :frowning: Any tips on this? Any way to preserve dependencies? Maybe w/Zapier or another integration?

  1. Is there a way to populate deadlines that have the same spacing out from each other but a different actual calendar date?

Like, Task A is always due 10 days before Task B, which is always due 5 days before Task C. Currently, I still have to go into a calendar and count out all the days for each task.

  1. Are there such things as living attachments in Asana? Like maybe a Google Sheets Viewer? :smiley: So that we can click-to-view a file, and if we edit it, it will update in Asana? Currently we are using Google Links… but Asana only brings over project FILES, not “links.” Any ideas on this?

  2. Random: Any way to make Asana ding on our iphones?

Thanks y’all!

Hi @Audrey_Mehring! I’m Lily, one of Asana’s Success Managers.

I’d like to ask for a little clarification on what you mean by re-hook up? I read this with the assumption that you’ve already set dependencies on your tasks with our Mark as Waiting on feature - can you confirm? This is definitely the most solid way for you to create the interdependencies between your projects.

Is there a way to populate deadlines that have the same spacing out from each other but a different actual calendar date? > At this moment in time it’s not possible but we hope that with future iterations of the Mark as Waiting one feature this type of functionality will be incorporated!

Are there such things as living attachments in Asana? > Do you currently use the Google Drive integration for your attachments? The sync enables you to make edits in Google Sheets/docs etc and have the live link in Asana update automatically to the most recent version. You do get a preview of certain files when you attach them to a task but unfortunately you’re not able to edit them from that preview.

As an Android user I’m going to let the Community answer that last one for you! :blush:

Looking forward to your reply and let me know if I can expand on anything!

1 Like

Hi Lily!

Yes, we are using dependencies heavily. Here’s our basic set up:

Project 1: April subscription box
Project 2: April Magazine supplement
Project 3: April webisode to promote subscription box.

I have dependencies across the 3 projects. For example, if I need to take stills for the magazine supplement (Project 2), I’ll mark that the task is waiting on the product approval in the Subscription Box (Project 1).

This is all awesome.
However, when we have to take the April projects (which are now complete)…and make copies of the projects to turn them into the May edition… I lose all my dependencies between Project 1 & 2, between 2 & 3, etc.

It sucks having to go back in to each task and figure out what it was dependent on in the other project.

Do you know of any use cases in which people found a faster way to re-link tasks from different projects to each other?

Yes, we do use Google Drive. The only downside is that I can’t see all the links associated with a project, so i have to fish for the link to the file I need. :slight_smile:

Thanks!

2 Likes

It sounds like you could create one project called April Monthly Production, and make a section for the box, magazine, and webisode. When you copy the project to start another month, you can choose which attributes come along. Dependencies is checked by default, and we always check Assignees to preserve those.

Remember that tasks can be nested, so the main list in April Monthly Production can have as many or as few items as you want, and you can use subtasks to organize further.