Lead Effective Weekly Meetings in Wrike

When done right, team meetings can be efficient and motivating. The goal is to ensure that time is well spent, the agenda is focused, and everyone walks away with clear action items and next steps.  As you know, Wrike is the perfect place to manage your tasks and projects. Through adding an extra layer of organization, you and your team can easily manage weekly work flow and run team meetings right from Wrike — hassle free.

First things first: set your goals

Before diving into setting up Wrike for weekly meetings, take a step back to make sure your team has clear goals. Google has a great approach for planning quarterly and annual goals. In Wrike, create two folders: high-level goals (1. Objectives) and specific big-picture actions you want to take to achieve them (2. Key Results). Then, have your team tag relevant tasks and projects into subfolders focused on achieving the Key Results.

Set your project goals

Organize by week to keep the team on track

Top performing teams organize their tasks by week in order to stay focused and ensure deliverables are generated by the time they’re needed. If you haven’t explored task tagging yet, pause your reading and take a look at this Help Center article. Wrike gives you the ability to put a task in multiple locations. This is essential for organizing your tasks by objective AND by week. After creating a folder system for months and weeks, all you need to do is drag the folder name and drop it on the task to tag it. This video will give you a quick overview.

Organize your projects by week to keep the team on track

Get ready for your meetings

With the weekly folders you created to organize deliverables and tasks, you are now equipped to run weekly meetings straight out of Wrike. Instead of harassing everyone to submit slides for the weekly meeting deck,  simply have teams go on Wrike and show the list of tasks they completed last week, then decide what will be done this week.

For tracking purposes, you can either push tasks from week to week as they’re rescheduled and pushed out, or leave the original week tags in order to see the history of where a task has been. This is a great way to identify bottlenecks and better understand which work is being prioritized.

For even more organization, consider including a Meeting Agenda and Action Items task in each week’s folder. This will be the task where people can jot down notes, high level thoughts, action items, and other initiatives to ensure there is a place to capture feedback and follow up. During the meeting, make sure you designate a recorder to keep track of actions items and ensure these are then converted into tasks with assignees.

Weekly folders can also help you understand bandwidth constraints on your team. When used in conjunction with Wrike’s Workload view, weekly folders are the perfect place to jump to when a last minute request comes to your team and you need to find someone to get it done.

Leverage analytics to understand where you’ve been and where you’re going

Wrike provides Action Progress Insights to add even more control and visibility to your work progress. The reporting engine crunches millions of work activity records and provides essential project data in the form of actionable infographics. These graphs work together perfectly with your weekly folders. Open the Analytics view on any week and get a detailed snapshot of weekly status and top performers.

Leverage project analytics to understand where you've been and where you're going.

We’ve made it easy for you to get started today. Download this template which has Week and Objective Folders already created for you, and then import it into your Wrike workspace.

Want to see this weekly set up in action? Check out my supplementary Youtube video for a quick run-through.

And if you aren’t using Wrike yet, you can start your own free trial today!

Redfoo’s 5 Wrike Tips for Business Success

Meet Redfoo: former member of LMFAO who has since become an independent recording artist and CEO of LaFreak clothing line and Party Rock Records. As a busy musician, he found it difficult to communicate with his team while traveling around the world, and his team had just as much trouble knowing exactly who was responsible for specific tasks.

But since implementing Wrike, Redfoo has seen a total transformation in the way his team works. They’re more productive, communicate better, and (most importantly) they have more time to have fun. Here are five of Redfoo’s secrets for Wrike success:

Tip #1 – Use Wrike during team meetings

Redfoo keeps his team organized by having everyone open their Wrike accounts during meetings. Each task and every idea goes straight into Wrike as they move through agenda items, so it’s clear who’s responsible and what the next steps are.

Some ideas:
Brainstorm with your team in Wrike
Add and assign tasks in Wrike while discussing upcoming events, projects, etc.
Share links and upload the latest document versions so everyone has access to what they need
Discuss overdue items with the team to uncover roadblocks and improve processes
Tip #2 – Create Wrike tasks via email

Wrike’s email integration makes it easy to create and edit tasks on the go. Redfoo uses this tool extensively to turn emails into action items and assign them directly to his team members.

Some ideas:
See your Wrike @mention notifications in your inbox
Reply to comments directly from emails
Capture and categorize important emails by adding them to the proper folder in Wrike
Redfoo’s 5 Wrike Tips for Business SuccessTip #3 – Keep an ideas folder

As an artist, Redfoo is constantly coming up with ideas for songs, events, and fashion designs. Wrike provides a secure, central location where he can archive every idea even before he decides what he wants to do with it. He knows exactly where to find his ideas and can rest easy knowing that nothing is lost or forgotten.

Some ideas:
Keep an “Ideas” folder to archive your thoughts
Within the folder, create subfolders for better organization
Add any attachments or links associated with the idea so everything stays together
Tip #4 – Use the mobile app to track tasks on the go

Wrike’s mobile apps for iOS and Android let Redfoo stay in contact with his team even when he’s halfway across the world. He can check project statuses, see the latest updates in his Activity Stream, and discuss progress or leave feedback for his team, minimizing project delays.

Some ideas:
Respond to comments and view the Activity Stream directly from the mobile app
Use your mobile device’s camera to attach photos to Wrike tasks
Record voice notes on your mobile device and upload them into Wrike
Tip #5 – Keep all project-related items in one location

Redfoo’s goal is to keep all work and ideas in Wrike. “If it’s not in Wrike, it doesn’t exist!” he says. Keeping everything in one place removes the stress of scouring countless emails and spreadsheets just to find a particular document, comment, or idea. Having all his project data consolidated also makes it easier to look back and see which processes worked and how to streamline.

Some ideas:
“Wrike it down!” Instead of capturing an idea on a post-it or in an email, just put it in Wrike
Duplicate folders and tasks or mark them recurrent to create project templates
Evaluate your process by reviewing completed projects and recording lessons learned
Watch the video interview with Redfoo, where he tells you how he uses Wrike to get work done:


How do you keep your team organized?

What are your tips for keeping your team organized? Tell us in the comments!

Read next:
Wrike it Down with Redfoo: How to Manage Projects Like a Rockstar!
Redfoo’s Success Story
12 Ways to Use Wrike You’ve Never Considered

Image Credit: Top photo by Tom Treanor

12 Ways to Use Wrike You Never Considered

Wrike is known for being one of the most flexible enterprise project management systems around — sometimes more flexible than we ourselves realize. Our customers are pretty creative with how they use Wrike, so we asked them to share their best tips and tricks.

Check out the unique ways Wrikers are taking advantage of our tool, and you might just discover a new, implementable Wrike hack for your team.      

Notification Settings Tips

1. Get your Daily Digest at the END of the day

“I changed my daily summary time from the beginning of the day (summarizing what happened yesterday) to 4:00 PM  (summarizing what happened today). I feel like this gives me a better opportunity to re-align my next day for anything I missed in the toaster pop-ups or activity stream.”
— Brandy Roberts, Continental Kennel Club, Inc.

2. Only focus on completed work via Notification Settings

“I have modified my notification settings so I only receive an email when someone completes a task, not every time they update it. It cuts down on email traffic, but let’s me know the progress my staff is making on certain projects.”
— Bethany Taylor, Dakota Security Systems, Inc.

Dashboard Widgets Tips

3. Give individual attention with person-centric Dashboard Widgets

“The dashboard: all my team members‘ project work in ONE place. I have a widget for each of them. During individual status meetings I print their list, go over it, and update Wrike as necessary.”
— Paul Stefanski, Metro Transit, St. Louis, MO

Folder Organization Tips

4. Transfer client information with Folder Info & Permissions

“Use the “information” part of each folder for crucial details that the whole team might need, not just an explanation. On our team, each client has a folder, and we keep goals, objectives, key contacts, email addresses, phone numbers, addresses, etc. That way, if a client ever transfers to another team, it’s only a matter of changing folder permissions.”
—Mark Curtis, ROI Revolution

5. Store email templates in a “Templates” Folder

“Create macros when working with a support team. This ensures that each email to a customer is consistent and provides your branding.”
— Jared White, Contra Costa Association of Realtors

6. Separate client-appropriate information with Subfolders

“For sharing outside of Wrike, use a subfolder in your project of high-level project tasks, with your date ranges. This will create clean Gantt charts and excel exports to be shared with others, while still allowing you to track the details separately.”
— Joe Kern

Folder Privacy Tips

7. Stalk interesting tasks with Private Folders

“If you are a project manager or client manager, I’ve found it very useful to create your own folder with permissions only for you that you call “Follow up” or “Watch”. Then you include all tasks that you need to keep an eye on in that folder. It might for instance be tasks that you are not responsible for, but still need to keep an eye on. Then you can also easily add a widget for this folder on the Dashboard and you can stay updated on what’s happening with those tasks as well. In the widget, don’t forget to include all statuses, otherwise completed tasks will disappear.”
— Olle W. Strahle, Wolfgang strategic design agency

8. Respect sensitive HR issues with Private Folders

“We share everything with everyone, in order to make sure the various projects are as transparent as possible. However, sometimes you just don’t want people others to know what you’re discussing, especially with sensitive HR issues. For this, we’ve recommended our employees use a private folder, and for each sensitive/private discussion creating a task within this folder, just shared with the people who need to be involved.”
— Name withheld, Environmental NGO

9. Sprint Folders save time spent on task management

“We have started using ‘Sprint’ folders, a folder where tasks from our various projects are dropped to show what we are working on now. Works great when you aren’t in a mode to assign and maintain dates for every task.”
— John Hansknecht, University of Detroit Jesuit

Folder Tags Tips

10. Forget Folder organization and just use Tags

“Once I realized that folders were like Tags on Evernote (or Gmail), the usefulness of having tasks in multiple folders expanded. Instead of having folders as the primary structure, now the tasks are the primary object, and I tag them with folders. We do a lot of task oriented bookkeeping work, and now I can have a task such as “2 items for bank reconciliation” tagged with the Client’s job, the site visit, each person at the Client I need to meet with about it, and the work type. Following this, I use folders more liberally for events such as meetings. If I meet with someone about it, I can include the task in the meeting folder, then again later in a follow–up meeting folder. I can look back at that meeting folder next month and see what we talked about, and see the status of each tasks we discussed.”
— David Prins, Mindful Financial accounting services

11. Track the physical location of objects with Folder Tags

“We started using Wrike for tracking Computer equipment. Create a differed task with title “Equipment ID – User’s Name”, the description has information on purchase date, special software, room located, links to drivers, etc. We then use folders to tag PC/Mac, Desktop/Laptop, Computer/Server/Printer, Department.”
— Justin Rentmeester, University of Wisconsin

Apps & Integrations Tips

12. Wrike+Wufoo+Zapier = automation magic

“I just started using Wufoo+Zapier to bring tasks into Wrike, and I have to say my life just got so much easier. My team supports about 30 clients, with between 5 and 10 project requests a day. With Wufoo+Zapier, I can automate a larger percentage of the reoccurring projects, without having to manually forward project emails. So happy!”
— Joshua Van Horsen, Drury Hotels

We hope you learned something interesting from some of our more unique use cases. If you have your own special way of using Wrike, share your story with us in the comments below. We’d love to hear how you use Wrike to suit your work style.

Image Credit: Mary Margaret on Flickr. Some rights reserved. Changes made.

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Why Wrike?

Wrike in a nutshell:
Wrike is an all-in-one project management and collaboration software that brings thousands of teams around the globe closer to success. It connects tasks, discussions, and emails to your actual project plan. You get an up-to-date picture of the project and can keep your team aligned with your strategy without boring status meetings.

Full description:
Wrike is an online collaboration and project management software bringing together centralized task management and social collaboration features into one real-time workspace. It connects tasks, discussions, and emails to your actual project plan. You get an up-to-date picture of the project and can keep your team aligned with your strategy without boring status meetings.

Wrike helps you see the big picture of your Project Portfolio
With multiple teams and multiple projects running concurrently, Wrike keeps you on top of your team’s work without extra email and status meetings. It helps you build repeatable processes, streamline operations, and get real-time visibility into the status of specific clients, projects, and key milestones.

Team collaboration is taken to a new level
With Wrike, your teammates can collaborate on projects in real time. They are more engaged because they know exactly what to do and how their work connects to others. As tasks are handed off, new contributors get the complete context, access to previous decision-making discussions, and relevant files are already attached, so they have all the info they need.

Managers get better, more predictable results
Robust tools for planning, project management, and workload optimization enable you to get the most from your team’s potential. Thanks to drag-and-drop support and bulk changing capabilities, it’s easy to create and maintain schedules to keep up with your fast-paced business.

Wrike's all-in-one collaboration and project management software is suitable for individual freelancers, SMBs, and large organizations with thousands of employees. The platform can be tailored to fit the individual needs of any team. It's a smart solution for project management, helping you get even more done! More than 1.5 Million people worldwide have tried Wrike and left tons of positive reviews on Trustradius, Capterra, G2Crowd, and other review sites.

Challenges Wrike helps solve:
Data silos: Tasks, discussions and documents scattered across email, Skype, personal computers and spreadsheets
Poor visibility into work status
Missed deadlines and project failures
Main benefits:
Accelerating project delivery by using a platform your team will actually use and love
Keeping all team members on the same page even across borders without lengthy status meetings, long email threads and spreadsheet updates
Big picture of project progress with real-time updates and cross-project reports and newsfeed
Real-time team collaboration with discussions, files attached to tasks, and a built-in document editor
Why Wrike?
Wrike is a system your team will use. It helps them do their work, not just track it.
Wrike can be easily customized to your needs as each team can set up their own workflow.
Wrike scales as you grow, providing visibility and ease of use for teams of any size.

Wrike main features:
Task management
Interactive Gantt chart
Workload management
Time tracker
Discussions
Real-time newsfeed
Document collaboration
30+ integrations
Email integration
Outlook, Apple Mail add-ins
iPhone and Android apps
Customized reports