See how all communication in a company can be organized into tasks and what you gain from it. How preparing and delegating tasks and running discussions in the context of specific topics calms the information flow in the company, reduces chaos and boosts efficiency.
⭐️ Key things you will learn from this episode:
- What is Task-Based Communication?
- 5 Steps to Effective Delegation Using Task-Based Communication
- Leveraging Technology: Using Nozbe for Task Delegation
- More Practical Tips about Effective Communication
- Delegating Tasks to a Boss & to a Person Sitting Next to You
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🙋 Meet the Host
- Michael Sliwinski (@msliwinski)
- Magda Błaszczyk (nozbe.pl/magda)
🔗 Show notes
- Getting Started with Nozbe in less than 5 minutes
- 7 Tips To Introducing a Task Management Tool In Your Team
- How to work effectively without email and messengers
- Nozbe Mighty Fridays
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Read this episode’s transcript if you prefer
Hello, hello, hello. Welcome to NoOffice Podcast 51. Hi, everyone. And this is Magda. That’s me again. And we are together, but apart. Yes, now everyone is in their own home office. Yes, I am in mine, you’re in yours. We are so many kilometers apart yet we can use the digital communication to record it in one virtual room. So let’s get started because we have today a great episode. So Magda, what do we want to talk about today? We want to talk about something that we are a little bit crazy about in Nozbe, and something that might not be fully clear to everyone. But we want to make sure you know why we are so much into task -based communication and delegating tasks no matter what. We are going to tell you why, what is it, and why we think it’s important. So Let’s start for this first point. What is it? This is a kind of communication when we don’t bump each other with messages, chat messages, emails, and any other types of messages. We just stick to tasks. And tasks are in context. They are in context of the projects that we earlier prepared. These projects are topics, are areas of your business, or these are aspects of you business. And inside these topics, we communicate through tasks. They are just established in this context, and it’s everything is structured, everything is nicely ordered, and it’s impossible to miss anything in this type of environment.
- Yeah, we believe so much in this simple structure of projects, tasks, and comments. And we always explain to our customers who very often who come to Nozbe and they’re like, “Yeah, but does it have this feature and this feature and this feature?” we’re like, yeah, we have all the features. We have features, don’t worry. But if you manage to put everything you’re working on into projects, tasks and comments, you’re already 90 % there. Like you’re already more organized. You know where to discuss things. You know a project is a big thing. It’s divided into smaller tasks. And in these tasks, you have comments where you can iron out the details or make sure to update on the status update of the task and just, you know, communicate through there instead of referring to email messages and all the chaos that comes with it. - Exactly, another thing very important about task-based communication is that it’s centralizing communication around tasks. Centralizing, it means focusing. And yeah, that’s what you said. we don’t have this multi-channel, chaotic conversations when no one can find anything. No, everything is centralized in preferably a nice task management tool. But of course, everyone can find their own way of centralizing this communication, but it should be based on tasks. Yeah, and it’s important that it’s all written down. So it’s not just that we said he said she said whatever it’s written down. So the information is like the project is written down the tasks are written down and the comments are written down. So even if somebody else joins the project they can catch up by just reading the tasks and the comments that are already there so that they can be on top of things very quickly and can catch up very quickly without needing additional meetings and additional reunions to make sure that they are on the same page. - Yeah, everything is registered. So there is no place for misunderstandings for situations like, “Oh, you didn’t tell me that.” We spoke on the phone, but I don’t recall you telling me that. Everything is written down, you can quote, you can always get back to the message that you think that is unclear. Just written communication is more reliable and more long lasting and more evergreen. Yes, completely. And the cool thing, you know, I have this story that recently in in Nozbe, our ex -co -host Rafał, he left the company and he was our VP of product and recently I was still catching up on some things after he left and I remember I stumbled one of the projects upon a conversation, upon a discussion in a task where Rafał was talking to Radek, our employee who left like a year ago. So I was like witnessing a conversation between two employees who no longer work with us, two team members who no longer are with us. But on the other hand, I saw the discussion, I saw what’s going on, and I could very quickly catch up on this, and I could quickly see what they have decided, what happened. And this way, what I like about this is the fact that even when people leave the company, which happens or the team or the change teams or whatever, the knowledge stays. So because it was written down in projects, tasks and comments. Yeah, it’s not just it stays, it’s structured and it’s so easy to search through. So - So yeah, you are right. This example is very good for illustrating how task -based communication works in practice. We said why we think it’s so important and why we find it so useful. Now, maybe we can give you some tips about how to effectively delegate tasks and how to do it right and how to do it so this task based communication works even better. First point is total clarity. Clarify your expectation when you are delegating or preparing a task for someone. Just write down what it is that you are expecting, what’s your goal, what should be the effect of this work, this task, What’s the deadline and whether it’s really urgent or not so urgent? Yeah, completely and Here I have a I have a tip for all the managers and bosses out there that and I Would say - if you want your people to work better for you You should do some homework as well. So for example, I I’ve always prefer to delegate a task with all the information I have. So for example, I want Magda to do something for me. So what I do is that I create a task for her, but it’s not like I just write a task name and just delegate Magda, that’s it, I’m done. I mean, very often, usually, I go to comment and write the first comment with all the information I have until now. So I say, “Magda, I would I have seen that and I have seen this, you know, this article and then I read this and then I saw this YouTube video and then I have this PDF here attached and like I explain everything and I’m like and you take it from there. So this way, it’s really clear. Magda knows what I want. She sees everything in the comment to the task. Then she doesn’t ask me so many follow -up questions And on the other hand, it’s easier for her to get started. So really, even if you’re like, let’s say, from the position of power, you’re the boss, you’re the manager, even at this moment, delegating a task is still a skill that requires really giving just more information because with this, your job basically is to make sure that others are doing great job for you. Exactly. Another point is that when you are delegating tasks, it’s your work. So as usually, we should look for ways to automate things and to optimize things. So if you are delegating tasks that has already been delegated or done before, don’t be afraid to use templates to reuse the tasks and the explanations and the expectations that you already wrote down before. It’s okay. It’s great to have templates. It’s great to set recurrence in tasks. It’s all about productivity. And at the same time, if your employees or if your colleagues know that you are going to delegate a similar task again and again, it will be easier for them to proceed because they will be familiar with this kind of task already. Yeah, we know that the key to productivity is to reduce the buyer of entry. So the easier you make it for other people, the easier it gets. We have a project template for a project of recording this podcast. So we have, you know, all the tasks to prepare the podcast to prepare this information that we’re sharing with you today, to schedule this live conversation, and then later to promote the podcast, of course. So we have all that in a project. And over there, as we create every two weeks, as we create another podcast episode, we are always tweaking the template. We are making sure that, for example, the people who are right for the job are doing the things that they’re right for. We discovered that some things that, for example, we delegated to Magda should be done by Emilia because she will do it faster. Yeah, because this is something she works on usually, so this is her field. Exactly. So this way, we keep tweaking this. Some things that I was supposed to do, I did to poll our video editor. So like all these things we keep on tweaking to make sure that every time we are recording a new podcast, we’re recording a new episode, the right person for the job does the tasks, so that then it makes the whole preparation of this effortless. Yeah, so the tip here is to assign your task and delegate your task to the right person. Ensure that tasks are delegated to the people who would do it best and in the shortest period of time. And probably you should take into consideration their strengths and expertise. Yes, completely. And you know, the next tip is what I actually kind of said already is that, you know, attach the context. So explain in detail in the, you know, as much as you can, you know, be the summary of chat GPT, you know, in the task, you know, what you want, how you want it. And then it comes with another tip to clarify expectations. And this way, so this way, people know also when things are due, how to, how to respond, when to respond, when to update you on this. So it’s really easy for other people to know what your expectations are, when they’re supposed to do it, and how. So for example, I just yesterday, I create the task for Magda to help me with the column I’m writing for a magazine, for a monthly magazine. And I asked her to do it by Thursday and I have to report that sadly that she disobeyed and she already did it on to the on Wednesday. So even though I was curious, she did it one day earlier. So yeah. Yeah, but you provided the context, yeah? So you always delegate a similar task to me monthly. So I really know pretty more. I know what to expect me to do. You also provided a small checklist with the points I should focus on, what should be translated, what should be double read. And so yeah, if if that person who is delegating, they know something, they shouldn’t be hiding it. Because this way, they are just avoiding and minimizing the follow up questions, and if the person doesn’t know what to do exactly, the task, the work will go slower. Exactly. So if you know something, just put it in your brief in the task, attach the documents, attach or maybe link to the similar tasks that were done before so that the person can compare and maybe copy cat a little bit. Yes, it’s really important It’s really important that in the comments, you provide all the information that you have at this moment. And also ask all the questions that you have as well. This is for me so much fun when I see that we’re working on something and in a span of a task, I can see how the task develops, how then later we figured, ah, we forgot about this. Oh, then we have to do this. But it keeps going. We keep asking questions until we’re done. So it’s really good. Yeah, another thing that I wanted to say here is that I wrote somewhere. The best way to use chat GPT and other AI based tools. Before you ask them something, or maybe no, first you ask them to do something and then quickly add a simple question. Hey, ask me all the questions you need to give me the right response. So it’s a little bit like with this question and this situation here. What you need to do the task in the best way possible. So if you have some knowledge, please provide it in your task. But then you also ask the person what they need to do it best. Yeah, exactly. So of course, now, if you are already solved on task -based communication, we would argue that the best way to do it is, of course, using our best tool in the world, Nozbe. There are other tools out there, of course, but ours is the best because it’s our baby, so we’re going to share our baby. And it follows the structure of projects, tasks, and comments. And we have additional features, as I mentioned. We have– in projects, you can have sections of projects. Then you have tags, which can help you additionally filter things out. And we’ll talk about it more in this second part of this podcast. But before I do, I want to also explain to you how you can get Nosbih at a special deal for Nosbih and start your task -based communication journey quickly. Thank you for being an amazing listener of the NoOffice podcast. Every other Wednesday we meet to talk about productivity and hybrid lifestyle, because we believe that work is not a place to go. It’s a thing to do. It’s a special gift only to know -office podcast listeners. When you sign up for Nozbe using this link, nozbe .com /podcast, you’ll get 30 bucks of credits, which you can use to upgrade to Nozbe Premium. Nozbe helps thousands of smart business owners and their teams get their professional and private life organized in a single app in a simple way. And Nozbe is free for up to three active projects and three people on your team. So start today and claim your free bonus credits, which you will later need to upgrade to unlimited projects. Once again, thank you for being an amazing listener. Thanks for your support and for spreading the word about our No Office podcast and Nozbe. See you and hear you in the next episode. And in the meantime, claim your bonus credits here. Okay. And Oscar goes Oscar goes to me for amazing ad read. Yeah. And in the, you know, in the notes below in the show notes of the podcast, we will also link to, to a page where we have a short five minute video how to get started in five minutes with Nozbe. So I’m, I’m proving to people that you can really quickly get started with Nozbe in less than five minutes with your coworkers. For free, completely. So make sure to check it out. And now let’s talk how we do what we do and why we do it so well. Yeah, as we said, you can use any tool that is for task management, but we will use Nozbe as an example because we work with it every day. So maybe it will be more practical. As Michael already mentioned, in Nozbe we have projects and tasks and within the tasks we have the special place, special space for discussion and for gathering all this information that is needed to get the task done. So that’s how it works. You create a small task within a project. And so the person who will be assigned to this task already knows the context. Okay, it’s in the project XYZ. It means that it will be related to XYZ topic. Then in the task, we define what we expect the person to do. We add a deadline. We choose the person who is the best to do this job. And in the comment, we write what we want to achieve. If you want to have some extra, extra, extra ways to, you know, to define this task or to decide when, in what mood, in what place you want to get this task done, you can use tags, which are the way to categorize tasks across different projects. But I think these three steps, projects, tasks and comments are totally enough to start task -based communication and to do it really, really well. Yeah, and what we have discovered is that people really want to have communication in one app. So back in the summer, we launched Messages in Nozbe. So not only you can communicate through tasks, but you can also communicate through messages inside of Nozbe. So you’re in the same context, you’re in the same app, you are not going to Slack or you’re not going to Messenger, WhatsApp or whatever. If you just want to ask a question or something. And we did it also because, you know, messages in Nozbe integrate very well with tasks. And the cool thing is that, for example, if in a message, you know, you write a long comment, which basically should be a comment to a task, in Nozbe you can just tap on this message and create a task from this comment, from this message. Yeah, because it very often happens that when you just chatting with someone, A really good idea is you come up with really nice things. So this way you don’t have to rewrite it and copy and paste it. Just with one click, you’re out of a message, you create an actionable task. - Yes, and just today, for example, I was writing a message to one of my coworkers. And then I realized that, so before I wrote to them Like a longer message. I was like, huh, maybe I should create a task for this So I created a task for it for this and then what I did is I just like went back to the message and said I wrote another message Yeah, so it’s already in this task. So it’s it’s all it’s all there, you know So also in that sense that it integrates very well and also spoiler art Messages group messages are coming to nosby very soon as well So we will we will be testing group messages right now inside of Nozbe and then soon we will release them to the world. So this way you know you can really have all of your communication in one app. Yeah I see you are as obsessed with tasks as I am. I also catch myself thinking okay I will message quickly to one of my colleagues and then I said no I won’t be messaging. I will just create a task for it, because it will end up with some kind of, you know, things that will have to be done anyways. Anyway, yeah, I mean, this is, you know, the cool thing is that when we launched messages in Nozbe, and we, many of our teams of our team members were skeptical about this, like, should we really have it, you know, isn’t that, you know, a distraction?
- Yes, Magda was one of them. And in the end, it’s turned out we love it. It’s great that it’s there, but we still, as you said, prefer to create tasks. So it doesn’t– - Exactly, I’m not using messages a lot. I just take the tasks.
- No, I use them basically just only for one purpose. Hey, can we chat for a few minutes? Like so, and also very often in the message what I write is, can we chat for a few minutes, I want to discuss this task or this project. And I link exactly what I want to discuss. So this way, I’m not adding noise to the current comments to tasks, so I’m writing a message, so it’s outside of that. But on the other hand, I link to our stuff. So that’s a great that’s a great thing. Yeah. So, in Nozbe, there are some ways for tracking the progress of a task. So, when I delegate a task to someone and I’m waiting for them to get it done or to proceed, I can observe how it’s going by looking into my activity view, where I can see all the changes that have been made to the tasks that I participated in or that I have created, I can see whether someone added a comment or uploaded a new attachment. But as well, it’s really nice to ask people how they are doing, but actually in our company, it’s not so needed, because usually people write themselves how things are and what is progress, especially on Fridays or on our mighty Fridays when we are running weekly review. Then in our key tasks, we just write a very, very short and basic report. How it’s doing, what I have done so far, maybe what I’m missing, what I need to proceed and stuff like that. Yeah, completely. I mean, we learned that actually writing comments to tasks is a form of journaling as well. So this way your journal, you’re like, you know, you’re finished your day, you write a comment to your task, you know, I stopped here, I was struggling with this and now I have to, you know, continue with that. So this way you write to yourself as a journal kind of and to others to see like what you’ve been working on. And I think, well, I’m a strong believer in writing is thinking. So by writing, you start, you know, thinking and processing your thoughts. So it’s really easy and it’s really good to journal to yourself and journal to others. And this way you’re sharing, you know, what you did. But on the other hand, you, you know, indirectly are asking for feedback. So I think it’s great. I think, you know, this kind of journaling, learning to journal through communicating with tasks is a cool thing. Yeah, here are some more practical tips regarding delegating tasks and working with tasks. First, I think we’ve already said it, but it’s, it’s always good to repeat that if a task is scary, or it’s too complex, It’s really good to break it down into smaller steps. You can just divide it into smaller tasks or when you are using a task management tool like Nozbe, you can within a task create a small checklist with the steps that you need to take to get this task done. And what’s nice that when you break a task into smaller steps, you don’t necessarily have to start with the first from the top. Maybe you are in the mood, or maybe you are more likely to get done the last one, or maybe the one that is in the middle, but this way you will move forward anyway. Yes, so it’s really, it’s also, you know, one of the features of NotSpace is that when you write a task and then you write a comment and then in comment write a checklist, you can actually convert this into a project. So you can convert this note to a comment to a project because this is what happens sometimes when you start small and then you see that actually it’s getting bigger and bigger. But I’m a really big fan of checklists because sometimes a task is like medium, you know, it requires several steps, but it’s not a project. So I prefer to write a comment, you know, in a checklist. And this way I can just follow the checklist. And really following a checklist is it gives you so much of this faction. It’s just you can just dunk, dunk, dunk, dunk, you just follow it, tick everything. And then you’re like, okay, it’s done. That’s true. Another point that I wanted to mention, although you’ve already done it, is the thing that with task -based communication and with writing these small reports and registering your progress, it’s really helpful in a company in terms of re -delegating or handing over tasks. Whenever people leave the company or whenever people just change departments, the task goes to another person. It gets reassigned. So this way, if there is a whole history of the task written down, the new person feels at home. They can see what’s been done, they have all the documents and the whole documentation. Mm -hmm. Yeah. Also, I want to point out that here, Mike Sampier, a big fan of our podcast, said that he’s also a big fan of Messages, and that it’s a great addition to the app. And I totally agree. Yes, our customers are also saying the same thing. So thanks, Mike. And this is so true. This is so true. And yeah, so speaking of feedback loops, there is no proper way to delegate. Everything, it depends on the culture of the company, of the team, of how you want to work. Some people prefer to, for example, have a task, let’s say, delegated to a person, and then when this person needs feedback, they just mention you, but the delegation stays the same. I mean, because they are responsible for the task, so they just mention you, they mention somebody else if they want some feedback from someone in the comments. And I love this fact that it’s so easy to ask for feedback. Like, I’m working on a task between– let’s say we’re working on a task between both of us. But I want some feedback from Amelia. I’m just mentioning at Amelia, hey, have you seen that? Or what are your thoughts? And then I get her feedback. So we have a group of all our marketing people. We have, we call it marketing team. So very often we just, you know, mention marketing team. This is, for example, what you do when you have demos. So there is a chance, you know, to talk to Magda, to have a demo of NosB, if you go to nos .com /demo. And when you schedule a demo with Magda, it automatically creates a task, of course, in NosB, because, you because of course, and then once the demo happens, Magda adds her notes, and then when she adds her notes, she mentions at the end of the note, add marketing team. This way, all of us are being mentioned there, because this way we can learn what she has learned in the demo, see how we can help her, how we can give her additional feedback. So this is one very cool Yeah, I have some secrets about how I deal with these tasks related to my demo meetings. One secret to reveal is in order to write down this report, this the whole summary of my conversation, which sometimes gets really long. Sometimes I talk for one hour or one hour and a half with a client, if they are not and if they have some questions, how to implement Nozbe in their work environment. And then what I do to stretch my back, to just change my position, I take my phone, I open Nozbe, I go to the task dedicated to this particular person, and I open the new comment window. And on the keyboard, I press a small microphone, which lets me dictate. It’s not a voice message, it’s dictating a text. And so for three or five minutes, I’m just walking around my living room or my home office and I’m dictating all my thoughts or what we said, what problems they faced. And when I’m done, I send the comment, I go back to my computer and I open exactly the same task and comment on my laptop. And I just edit a little bit this comment because sometimes with dictating, it doesn’t work perfectly. So I have to change several weird words that Siri understood. And yeah, and this way I have a really nice comment with a lot of information. As you said, I always mention my team if there are some question technical questions. I also mention the person for technical department so that they can also respond to some of the questions that I couldn’t reply myself during the conversation. And what else? Oh, and at the end, because this is this demo thing, it’s kind of sales chat. So I want to know how it went. So what I do is I change the delegation of this task to the person from our customer support. They have the access to our payment system and our back end system. And they will see whether the person decided to buy the subscription or maybe the person resigned. And then so I delegate, redelegate my task to another person and I give them the deadline for the next week. And in a week, they just come back to me with some feedback. Magda, oh, they bought a one month subscription or they wrote to us with some more technical questions. So yeah, so we play kind of ping pong. I delegate the task to add someone when they are done, they delegate it back to me and so it goes. Yeah, I mean, it’s perfect. It works very well. And I like your idea of dictating things. And I like your idea. I mean, and this is what we’re also, you know, kind of selling with NoSpeed is that NoSpeed works great on all the platforms. So you can, like what you did, you know, you can work on your desktop with NoSpeed, and then you stand up, pick up your phone, everything automatically synchronizes to your phone. So you just open the same task, you open the comment, you dictate the comment, you sit down by the computer, the comments syncs back to your computer, and then you can edit the comment, and then you can mention us, and this way everything is perfect. So it’s really like this way that you can work from anywhere with Nozbe. This way, again, there is no excuse for you not to delegate tasks to others, not to write the back, you know, and it’s, it’s, it’s there. You have the, you have the phone with you. And one of our customers, he is supervising several renovations, you know, and several places in, in, in, in the whole country. And he says that, and it has testimonial, he, he actually told me that, that thanks to Nozbe, he’s present everywhere. Like he is, he can supervise several renovations, several, you know, building sites, because he just changes the project and he just takes what’s going on in each of the projects. So for him, this is like his superpower that he can be anywhere. He can basically teleport, thanks to using NOSP, he can use it, you know, on the phone. So it’s like, I’m really, this is something I’m really proud of. And I think I’m really happy with that we can power people to basically manage their business from the palm of their hands. Like this is something really, really powerful on these days. Yeah, that’s true. That’s true. All right. So speaking of, you know, we spoke a lot today and we’re getting back, getting, getting slowly to the finish of this, of this episode. But, you know, it was us with our infinite wisdom, how we, how we told you about, you know, task -based communication, But let us give you some additional tips. But especially, Magda has prepared some additional sources that confirm what we just said. But before we do that, I’ll let Sarah talk about how Nozbe basically helped build her business.
- When we’ve been around for about 10 years, our business has, and we’ve been knows me for about eight of those years. And as we grew, we kind of got to the point where I just couldn’t remember everything anymore. I’m pretty organized. I would just kind of keep everything in my head and with post -it notes and things like that. And it just got to be too much. And so I started looking around for some sort of project management software that could help me have a set up really trusted system. But really, I just wanted a system where I could know that I had everything in there. I wasn’t going to forget anything. I wasn’t going to drop any balls for clients or missed deadlines. (upbeat music) - Yeah, so I think what Sarah said, it’s really critical that you can find things quickly. And I remember while talking to Sarah, she told me that when she was on a call, for example, with a potential customer, and they would say their name, she would quickly search the name in Nozbe. And very often she would find, for example, an old task with this customer that you know never closed and say a sale that never closed And in this task she had a comment with everything all the information that they discussed on that go So she’s like, you know when they’re saying their name and they’re like probably don’t remember me and she’s like Oh, yes, I remember you we discussed this and this you know two years ago when you were thinking They are like blown away that you know She remembers and of course she doesn’t remember but she has the tasks and the comments, like she has the information. And and she can find them. Do you remember, Michael, the person who shared the experience with multiple channels? Oh, man, like, like, like earlier today, we had a comment, you know, that one of our listeners said that, you know, it’s hard to convince people to use one app. But on the other hand, the site is that because in his team they are using different apps, they had a WhatsApp, Messenger, email, like multiple channels. Yes. And they had a client meeting and they had to find something. And this person was frantically searching for it while they were just sitting quietly, awkwardly with the client for 15 minutes waiting for this guy to find the information - Just crawl through all his chat applications and tools. Jesus, it’s so great to have Nozbe with task -based communication. When you just use the search tool, you type the keyword that you remember that you probably wrote in one of the comments and Nozbe just shows you several suggestions. - Yeah, I mean, you can search not only in the task names, but also in the task comments. So in the end, you will find these things, you know, and you can also search in completed tasks and completed projects, which really this makes it so easy to, you know, close the loops, close the projects, close the tasks, but then later get back. Like, how many times when we are organizing our reunion, for example, we have checked our previous reunions. So our previous projects from reunions to see how we did something, how we ordered something, how much something cost. Like, we’ve got this information, it’s just there, you know, and you can find it, you know, also with, you know, having us be on your phone. So, okay, Magda, but… We have our own opinions, we have Sarah’s opinion, and just when I was preparing for this episode, I came across So in scientific research and studies, one was in, I think it was published in Harvard Business Review and the other one in a journal of Applied Psychology, and both these sources showed me that people, they really need to have tasks delegated to them. If people feel that They have access to the necessary resources. They know what to do. They receive clear task instructions. Their performance improves up to 25%. Can you imagine? Just by going through with task -based communication, you can do so much more. Yeah, and whenever people are asking us about Nozbe, I’m just telling them that they can get at least an hour or two a month using Nozbe, which I’m just like really lower in the expectations. But 25%, like man, this is like one week extra of work that you don’t have to search for things, you have the clarity of what you want to do, you have the clarity of execution, you know, you know, the things that have to be done. Like, just, you know, Magda, just think about this podcast, like, you know, in the beginning in September, Remember, when we were getting started, it was much more work. Now this podcast is much less work from us. It’s easier to still focus. So this time that we gained by not having to manage this podcast so much, we can spend on preparing a better episode, on doing more research, just like this journal for So, like, we can do that, you know, to give people better quality feedback. That’s true. At the end we have some, I don’t know how to say it, some things that we want to tell you about and ask you about. First thing we want to ask, especially the managers and the bosses, is the fact that the task is not a crime. Getting a task is not a humiliation. Just let your people, the people from your team, your employees also task you with some jobs. Sometimes instead of calling you or going to your office asking you for something, if they just create a task and they write down what they want to know or what they need from you, - It’s nothing wrong. - Yeah, I mean, this is something that I have seen some managers and bosses struggle, that how I am the boss, I am delegating tasks, not people are getting tasks to me. Like, you know, but yeah, but with task -based communication, we are leveling the playing field, you know, we are working together. So it means that if somebody wants something from you, they create they create a task for you, not to give you a job, but to actually ask you for some information or for some feedback or whatever they need to do also their work. So it’s really okay that people are creating tasks for you. I mean, for me, many people are creating tasks for me, and it’s even better if we are discussing something on the video call or whatever. I’m like, okay, create tasks You know, just, you know, if you want this for me to be done, create a task for me. If you don’t, if you will not create the task for me, I will not do it. So there is a big chance you will just lose it somewhere. You will forget. Exactly. Exactly. But this way, but this way it’s written. It’s written down. It’s there. And it’s delegated to you. And they get to me. So it’s going to, you know, be come to my incoming in Nozbe. It’s going to be there. And as you have seen recently, I’ve been really diligently cleaning my incoming. So every time there is a mention on somebody’s again, that’s to me, I am responding quickly to make sure that people can keep up. You know, for me as a boss, I think the worst part is that when I’m a blocker, when I’m blocking something from happening, you know, it’s it’s I hate it. And I think people hate it more, You know, so so this way if I keep playing if I keep you know kicking the ball back People are you know playing faster and playing better and I’ve seen our team You know these past months play much better Because we’ve been all supporting each other and one of this way you’re not a bottleneck Exactly. I’m not a bottleneck anymore. I am you know kicking the ball as well. And, and this is really important, you know, this is, this is really crucial and it really helps, you know, also this camaraderie, like you, like you’re like better like your partners in crime, you know, when you work together when you delegate tasks to each other when you do the task ping pong. It’s, you know, I think this is the way to go and this is the way people actually like to work. Yeah, this is a sense of being together and doing fighting for the same goal. Another postulate we have for you is don’t be afraid to create tasks and task people and delegate tasks to people who are sitting in the same room or even at the same table. There is nothing wrong with that because as we said, written communication is more reliable. If, of course, you can tap someone on the shoulder and tell them, hey, quickly, can you give me this and this? Or can you do this and this for me? But then, okay, but how? But when you didn’t tell me that? Oh, it was yesterday, but we didn’t fully understood each other. Come on, if you just create a small task for the person who is sitting next to you, it will be written down, you’ll have access to it in the future. Other people will be able to see what you guys decided or what you are guys planning. So there is nothing, task -based communication is not just for remote or dispersed teams. It’s also for people who are working in the office. - I have two examples. So one example is just today. I had a meeting with a client, a Zoom meeting with a client. And after the meeting, I wanted to discuss this meeting quickly with Emilia, because she is responsible for this client. So I wanted to jump with her on a short call just to discuss the things from this meeting. After that, what I quickly did is jumped back to the comment and wrote down what we discussed with Emilia and what I discussed with the client as a note to this task. This way, not only Emilia and me are in the know, but everybody else can be in the know what’s going on. I don’t feel excluded. And you don’t feel excluded, Magda, exactly that, you know, it was a secret meeting of Emilia and Michael, and I wasn’t there. So exactly. So this way, you know, I needed her quick feedback in a verbal form, you know, on a quick Zoom call, because I was fresh of this call. But then later we did write things down so that everybody else knows and also that we can then, you know, work through this together like longer because of course the first impression is the first impression but later when you write it down, as I mentioned, writing is thinking. You put things in perspective and then you can get additional feedback also from Magda who is also in the know because she can see the comment. Yeah, I think - I think I know what other example you want to give us. - Exactly. So one of our customers, I remember vividly this story, they were using Nozbe a lot before the pandemic. But when the pandemic hit and everybody had was forced to go to home office, he told me, it was like for them, nothing changed. ‘Cause they were going to the office every day before the pandemic. They were all working from the same office, but they were using Nozbe and they were using task -based communication all the time because they are a company that manages many, many buildings and many, many, you know, apartments. Rental management. Rental management. So they needed to have everything written down, of course, you know, the contracts, everything, you know, the situation, the upkeep, everything. He said that at the moment they went to their home offices, they were like, “Huh, basically nothing changed. We are still communicating through tasks, just that we are not in the same place now, but other than that, everything just… Like, for them, this transition was so smooth, they just were surprised that they didn’t skip a beat. Like, it’s just like natural transition. So, it’s so worth to create such a culture and this kind of communication that is based on tasks. And this is our last call to action for you. Just try to look into your way of communication and delegation processes. Maybe you can identify some areas where you could introduce task -based communication, or maybe you are already doing it, but maybe you could improve it even more. even more. Just think about these things that you as a manager or a boss could improve to make it easier for people to do work for you. When you just reply to comments, when you give them more feedback, when you prepare a task for them with all your thoughts, like all these things that we mentioned today. And some people tell me, “Michael, I’m just like this guy today about, you know, searching for information for a client for 15 minutes, that it’s so hard to change habits of the company, you know, to start doing task space communication. And in the show notes, again, as we mentioned, we’ll link to this video where I explain how in five minutes flat with a timer, you can set up from nothing and not be account, a free not free Nozbe account, invite your two coworkers and start your first projects and first tasks together. And I would encourage you to start small, to just do it, set up an account, start adding your first projects and tell your coworkers, look, these three projects will do only in Nozbe. Everything else will do the old way, you know, we’ll send emails and stuff. And then you’ll see the difference. You know, for me, you know, all my life, I was always thinking that, you know, if you want to make sure that you have an opinion on something, try it. So if you try it, you will see the difference. You will see the comparison. Okay, so do we want to keep emailing each other or and sending WhatsApps or messages or whatever? Or do we want to write everything in projects, tasks and comments? That’s a great final. - All right, thank you so much for listening. So we’ll be back in this time in three weeks because we’re not recording because of the All Saints Day. So we’re taking a longer break from the podcast. So in three weeks, there will be a new recording of this podcast. As always, 10 a .m. New York Eastern time. And this is 4 p .m. in Europe. So it’s a good time for us at the end of the workday and for Americans, for our American friends at the beginning of their workday to be live for you guys. And of course, for everyone who’s listening, audio, they can download the new episode as soon as it becomes available on a Friday. So please try task -based communication. Let us know how it went. Just email support @nosb .com or questions @nosb .com and let us know. And if you have any problems or you are afraid to start, you can just set up an appointment with me, schedule a consultation, and I will be happy to help you. Go to nozbe.com/demo and talk to Magda. Okay, thank you so much, and see you and hear you in the next one of NoOffice episodes. Because remember, work is not a place to go. It’s a thing thing.
