Table of Contents

Wrike Course Development Template 2.0 - What's New

Overview

In this article we will cover the main changes within the new course development template 2.0 for Wrike. These changes were informed by feedback received from team members over the six months of using the first iteration of the template. The ultimate goal of this update is to make the template easier to understand, lighter weight to manage, and more comprehensive to project variants.

Reduced and Refined Structure

The main difference in the 2.0 dev template is the reduction of the number of tasks and task levels within the project structure. Where previously there were often 3 levels of tasks in a course project, for the majority of milestones there will now be 2 levels of templated tasks. 

The goal of this change is to greatly reduce the number of singular tasks individuals will need to track and keep updated. Where individual steps of a process were previously represented as multiple tasks, you’ll now see those as a single encompassing task. 

Those process steps will now be commonly represented as templated checkboxes. We will cover this area in further detail below. 

Checkboxes

With the reduction in number of tasks, a new task-step structure has been added in the Description field of some tasks using Wrike's Checkbox feature. Here is an example of what you will start to see in some tasks:

Checkboxes are meant to represent the steps that need to be taken for a task to be completed. The majority of the time all of these steps and tasks can be completed by one person who is assigned to the task. In some cases, steps of the task will need to be completed by multiple individuals. In those cases, a role will be associated with each step in the task. See an example of this here:

Another important note regarding checkboxes is the difference between them and subtasks. From the task details view, subtasks and checkboxes can look similar. However, they serve different functions in Wrike. Some of the key differences between them are:

  • Subtasks can be assigned to individuals; checkboxes cannot.
  • Subtasks will be visible outside of the task detail view, such as in table or gantt view; checkboxes are not.
  • Subtasks are used to represent distinct pieces of work/tasks needed to complete a larger effort. A potential guideline is if a particular piece of work will need more than 4 hours of effort at least, it should be a subtask. If that piece of work is only a step in a larger process that takes under an hour to complete, it should be represented as a checkbox.

Simplified Predecessors

A feature of the 2.0 template is the reduction of the complexity of predecessors present in the templated tasks. In the previous template, it was difficult to adjust the top-level task dates, because they would be overwritten by the dates of the subtasks. Another challenge was if users added additional subtasks later in the sequence of the templated tasks of a task bucket, the predecessor configuration would not be able to recognize the dates of those lower level tasks at the milestone level. We have improvements for both these issues now.

For the issue of wanting to adjust the milestone dates directly without them being overwritten by the descendent subtask's dates, we have removed FF predecessors all together from the template, so this will not happen anymore. To replace this, we instead use SS (Start to Start) predecessors on the first task under each milestone, so there is still a relationship between the two levels but it's less brittle. Additionally, most people do not need to understand or use SS predecessors and can ignore them, and only keep track of the most standard type of predecessor - FS (Finish to Start).

For the issue of the dates of new subtasks being added not carrying up to the milestone, the feature "Item roll up" can be used to synchronize these easily. To do this, from the Gantt view simply right click on the Due Date field for a milestone task you wish to synchronize with the Due Dates of its descendants, select "Item roll up". This will synchronize the due date of the milestone with the latest due date of its subtasks, if you wish.

Keeping milestone task dates updated will be important communicating project progress to your managers and other stakeholders. Keeping subtask dates updated will be important for communicating with other course production team members, and help give a sense where your hands-on course work currently stands.

Custom Workflows/Statuses

Throughout the 2.0 template, there are multiple custom workflows associated with projects and certain tasks. Custom workflows allow the use of more unique and specified statuses. The areas where you will see custom workflows are:

  • Certificate Project Level
  • Course Project Level
  • Animation Development
  • Individual Video Assets in Animation Dev Cycle
  • On-Demand Workflow

The custom workflows present on the certificate and course projects will supplant the more generic project statuses we were working with before.

The individual statuses for the course level are:

The custom workflows for the animation development cycle are used to be able to mark a task with a unique status that only applies to the development of either a course’s animations as a whole, or for the animation phase of a specific asset. Here are examples from each of the areas mentioned:

Animations Development Cycle:

Animation Asset Workflow:

Each one of these custom workflows will be described further in the individual 2.0 articles that will pertain to your role.

Modular Template

The new template is designed to package all possible task milestones into one project template, instead of having multiple project templates for different types of courses (first courses, tech courses, etc). When the project plans for a new certificate are being built, it is then decided which task milestones will apply to that project, and the unnecessary milestones/buckets will be removed from the project plan.

This new process will be carried out with an increased amount of participation between the ITG employees and the IDDs when project plans are first being built out in Wrike.

Selecting which milestones/tasks to keep and which to remove is a variable most team members will not have to consider or worry about. However, it is important that to understand the reasoning behind the inclusion of less-common and content-specific milestones & tasks in the new Wrike template.

Non-Video Asset Process

The Non-Video Asset task bucket will now be represented with a different structure than in the previous template. Before, the structure was represented by module-based tasks. In the new template, it will be structured by a phased approach.

In the 2.0 template, there are four main phases, represented by individual subtasks;

  1. Draft
  2. Faculty Add Content
  3. Edit/Revise
  4. Add to Canvas

Here is a view of the templated tasks in Wrike:

Within each subtask, checkboxes will be used to indicate the individual assets for the course. These can be entered in the first Draft subtask, and then copy-pasted in the other phase tasks for future use.

When each asset has been completed for one of the phases, the user will mark that as done using the checkbox. Here is a view of how a project might look part way through the drafting phase:

When all the assets have been completed in a phase, the task status should then be switched from In Progress to Done.

One way to structure the asset checkboxes is to clearly mark which assets will eventually go to the Creative team, and which ones won’t. Here is an example of how that might look:

When ready to handoff the assets needing Creative team involvement, that will be done in two specific tasks that are now separated with a "CSG - " tag in the task title. These tasks will also be represented in the "phased" approach explained above.

First a task representing the request from the ID/IDA and the initial work from IGD. And then a review and finalization task, where the graphic elements will all be attached in Wrike Proof for review comments and iterations.

Each graphic element that needs Interactive Graphic Designer effort will be listed in checkboxes in each one of these phased tasks. Here is what a course's "CSG - Downloadable & Interactive Styling" might look like when being submitted to the Creative team:

Task Title Sequencing

Task titles will now appear a bit differently than before. Tasks will not contain a simple numbering structure in order to create a chronological order of tasks when sorting a project by “Title”.

The sequencing structure is as follows: each task milestone has been given a single-digit number to represent where in the order of the process a task milestone is supposed to be started. Task milestones that have the same number next to them should be able to be started at the same time. For example, the video and non-video asset task buckets:

Subtasks will also be given a single digit number to represent the chronological order they will be completed in. And again, if tasks share a number, it is assumed that these can be worked on simultaneously. For example, the Review bucket and its subtasks:

The order of the templated tasks in no way makes it impossible to start a task out of the order it has been given by the sequencing of title names. In other words, in the example above, if a course’s workflow for some reason dictates needing to specifically start the IDD review far before the Student Experience Review you can absolutely do so.

How did we do?

New Experience Update in Wrike

Wrike - Course Development Template 3.0 Release Notes

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