Project Card Walls in TeamDynamix

Contents

1. What are Card Walls?
2. Why Utilizing Card Walls With Intention is Beneficial
3. Creating Card Walls in TDNext: A Guide for Managers
4. Technicians and Card Walls: A Guide for Technicians
5. Communication with Stakeholders using Card Comments
6. Leveraging Card Walls for Project Management

What are Card Walls?

Think of card walls as virtual corkboards where you can post, manage, and monitor tasks or tickets. It's a visual tool to organize work, track progress, and facilitate collaboration. Managers of a project can use card walls when handling complex projects with multiple tasks, or when they want a clear overview of the team's current work status.  For technicians performing the work, card walls provide an easily updatable and departmentally shared environment for collaboration. 

In TeamDynamix (TDX), card walls are attached to a Project within the Plan subsection.  This is the core area where the work within a project is assigned and tracked. 

Projects are created directly by a director or Project and Change Management Office (PCMO) staff for operational projects, or via the Project Intake process with the PCMO. 

Why Utilizing Card Walls With Intention is Beneficial

• Provides high-level visibility of the Department of IT's (DoIT) overall work, individual and team capacity, and anticipates for planned distribution of future work.
• Provides a flexible tool that allows managers of a project to collaborate with their teams. 
• Provides a single tool for those completing work to update their progress and collaborate with other DoIT members. 

Creating Card Walls in TDNext

1. Log In to TDNext
2. Access Your Project
   Navigate to the specific project where you want to create the card wall. You can do this by selecting 'Projects' from the main menu, and then selecting your project from the list.
3. Create a New Card Wall
   Once inside your project, find and select the 'Plans' option in the project menu, usually on the left side of your screen. Select '+ New', provide the card wall name, and select the Card Wall as the Plan Type.
   The Project and Change Management Office (PCMO) can help you create card wall templates (especially useful for standard operational projects) to save time doesn't have to standardize and recreate your own card wall approach each time.  To request help, please submit a request with *X Service*
4. Define Your Card Wall
   Here, the project manager can configure the columns.  In reporting, columns will represent your project's stages (Ex: In Queue, Approval Stage X, In Progress, On Hold, Completed).  Note: only users designated as managers can create or modify the high-level configuration of a card wall.
5. Set Up Your Cards
    
   Include core information within the cards you create.  Consider the information should:
   Help your team understand/complete their work.
   Provide data that helps project managers and directors make informed decisions to manage workloads.
   
   Information within a card should be the name of the card/task, the resource(s) to perform the work, the due date, status (which column a card is in), and an estimated time for completion. Please provide supplemental information as needed or that would be helpful.  For example, you can contribute attachments to the card for reference.
6. Save Your Card Wall
   Once a card wall has been created, all changes to the card wall are live.  Changes will immediately be visible to anyone viewing the card wall.
7. Assign Tasks/Cards
   You can now begin to assign tasks or tickets to your team members. They will appear as cards that can be moved across the card wall as the tasks progress.

Technicians and Card Walls

Card walls are a compass to navigate and update assigned work and to communicate issues to people who need to be informed. 

• Task Assignment: Card walls clearly delineate your responsibilities, helping you manage your tasks better.
• Prioritization: With all tasks laid out visually, it's easy to understand what needs your attention first.
• Effort Tracking: When "Updating" a card, you can put in an estimate of how much time of your day the work has taken.  Essentially, you're logging your effort against each task on the card wall. This ensures your hard work is always recognized and accounted for. 

Card Walls contain:

• Title: The name of the task.
• Description: Details about what the task involves.
• Assignee: Who is responsible for completing the task?
• Labels: Tags that can be used to categorize or prioritize tasks.
• Due date: When the task should be completed.
• Checklist: A list of subtasks or steps to be completed. You can add items to the checklist and mark them off as they're completed.
• Comments: A section where team members can discuss the task, ask questions, or provide updates.
• Attachments: A place to upload any files related to the task.
• Activity: A history of all actions taken on the card.  Adding a comment here can provide an update directed to users who need to be informed.  Alternatively, you can provide updates when adding effort towards the project when submitting work effort.

Here's how to interact with a card:

• Update the Card:  To make changes to any of the features, click on the 'Edit' button (usually represented by a pencil icon). Update the necessary fields and click 'Save'.
• Add a Comment:  Scroll down to the 'Comments' section. Type your comment in the box and click 'Post'.
• Use the Checklist:  If the card has a checklist, you can add items to it by typing in the 'Add an item...' box and press Enter. Check off items as they're completed by clicking on the checkboxes.  (Note, this will automatically update the card percentage and may not be the best method depending on the complexity of work represented in the card)
• Add an Attachment:  To add a file, click on 'Attachments' and then 'Attach a file'. Locate the file on your device and click 'Open'.
• Move the Card:  If you need to change the status of the task, you can drag the card to a different column on the card wall.

Remember, card walls are not just a tracking tool, they're a communication tool.  Use them to keep everyone aligned on the team's work and progress. The result?  Better collaboration, fewer meetings, and a smoother path to project success. 

Communication with Stakeholders using Card Comments

Card comments are a great way to keep everyone in the loop. Here's how you can use them:

• Adding a Comment: Select a card to open it, find the 'Comments' section, and write your update or question.  If there is a stakeholder viewing the project from the client side, make sure to not have comments set to private.
• Tagging Stakeholders: If you want to direct a comment to a specific person, They will receive a notification.
• Attaching Files: You can attach files to your comments if you need to share a document, image, or other relevant files. Select the 'Attach file' button, usually represented by a paperclip icon.
• Notification Settings: Ensure that your notification settings are correctly configured so you get alerts when someone comments on your cards. You can adjust these settings in your profile.

Leveraging Card Walls for Project Management

As a project manager, card walls:

• Track Progress: At a glance, see where every task stands within a project or segmented area of a project. This provides real-time insight, enabling informed decision-making.
• Assess Workload: Understanding each team member's workload can help in fair distribution of tasks, and individual capacity, boosting overall morale and productivity.
• Standardize and Flex: While card walls promote a standard method for managing work, they also allow each group to adapt it according to their work type.
• What benefits the Project and Change Management Office (PCMO), IT directors, and the CIO is the ability to understand project-level work across the Division of IT (DoIT) at a high level.