How to break a task down and put it in order

Two different things get confused constantly, so here they are side by side. A sub-task is a step inside one job, and a blocker is a different job that has to finish first.

Both are managed from the task panel described in How to edit a task.

When do you want each one?

Use a sub-task when the work is one deliverable with parts. "Autumn lookbook" with "book studio" and "brief retoucher" under it is one job that several people chip at.

Use a blocker when two separate jobs have an order. "Cut the sample" cannot start until "lab dip approved" is done, and both are real tasks owned by different people, possibly in different teams.

The test is ownership. If finishing the small thing is not interesting to anybody outside the job, make it a sub-task.

How do you add sub-tasks?

Type into the Add subtask… field on the task panel and press Enter. The cursor stays put, so you can type several in a row without reaching for the mouse.

Each sub-task row has a small avatar button to assign it to somebody, and a circle to complete it without opening anything.

Click a sub-task title and it opens in its own panel, with a back arrow at the top to return to the parent.

Sub-tasks go exactly one level deep. A sub-task has no Sub-tasks section of its own, which keeps a task list readable rather than turning it into a tree nobody can scan.

Where do sub-tasks show up?

On the parent's row as a count chip, in every list and on every board card, so you can see at a glance which jobs have loose ends.

They also count toward a project's progress bar, so a project that is half done in sub-tasks reads as genuine progress rather than nothing.

Sub-tasks assigned to you appear as ordinary rows in My tasks, listed on their own rather than tucked under the parent. That is what you want when the question is "what am I doing today".

On a board, only top-level tasks appear as cards. Sub-tasks live on the parent.

How do you say one task is waiting on another?

Open the task that has to wait, find the blocker control on its panel, and search for the task it needs by title. Add it, and the panel now shows two lists.

Waiting on is what this task needs first. Blocking is what is waiting on this one. Both are clickable, including across departments, so you can walk a chain either way.

Remove a blocker with the X beside it.

The row and the board card pick up a Waiting on N badge, counting only the blockers that are still unfinished. Finish the blocker and the count falls on its own.

What happens when you finish something that is still blocked?

Tideswell asks. Completing or moving a blocked task opens a confirmation that names the problem and offers Complete anyway or Move anyway.

This is on purpose. The person doing the work knows more than the graph does, and a sequence recorded last month should not stop somebody who can see the thing is fine.

There is one place the override is not offered: acting on a whole selection at once. See How to change many tasks at once for how that reports back.

When a task of yours becomes unblocked, it lands in your Inbox. You do not have to watch for it.

Does archiving a blocker leave a task stuck?

No. An archived blocker stops counting, and the Waiting on badge falls accordingly.

The same is true of a completed one, which is the ordinary case. A blocker only holds a task while it is genuinely open.