1. Introduction to the Timeline Workflow
2. The Timeline Inititiative Properties
3. How to create Timeline Initiatives in the Timeline Workflow?
4. How to break down the Timeline Inititiative into smaller cards?
5. How do we know when the Timeline Initiative starts and finishes?
6. Can you manually change the Actual start date to a present or past date?
7. How to create Initiatives in the past?
8. How do Timeline tracks support your work?
9. How to manage your Timeline Workflow settings?
1. Introduction to the Timeline Workflow
The Timeline Workflow is an innovative planning approach that allows you to visualize your Initiatives in a linear calendar view. You can add the Timeline Workflow to every Board in your account.
Select the "Edit Workflow" icon at the top of your Board and enable the Timeline workflow.
The Timeline runs horizontally across the top of your Board layout. In this way, you can visualize all Initiatives in a roadmap style on an uninterrupted timeline.
The Timeline Workflow works only with Initiatives and not individual tasks. Each initiative represents a project or a larger piece of work. The Initiative shows duration (start & end), progress as well as project delay. You create Initiatives on the Timeline Tracks.
When you create your initiative, you have to break it down into child cards that outline its scope. You can use multiple tracks to plan your projects.
*Open the Image in a new tab to get a closer view.
The Timeline workflow allows you to swipe horizontally to go forward and backward in time.
Use the mouse and swipe right to go to past dates and events. Swipe left if you want to create or see Initiatives in the future.
You can change the timeband period of display: Auto, Days, Weeks, Months, Quarters, Tertiles and Years.
Use the Zoom option (1) at the top right corner to define the timeband period.
Tip: Alternatively, you can use CTRL + mouse wheel scroll to additionally zoom in and out the range of period units (days, weeks, months, etc.) of your timeband.
(2) To quickly jump to today’s date -> click Today. Note that Today is marked by a vertical green line marker.
2. The Timeline Initiative properties
The Timeline Initiatives are bound to the calendar by a set of time-related properties that define the Planned Start and End dates against the Actual Start and End dates.
When you open the Timeline Initiatives, you will notice the Timeline fields.
- Planned Start Date vs Actual Start Date
- Planned End Date vs Actual End Date
The system automatically records the dates to precisely reflect the reality.
3. How to create Initiatives in the Timeline Workflow?
You create Initiatives to visualize projects or larger pieces of work. Then you have to break them into smaller child cards. The system allows you to create Initiatives in the past, present, and future.
The vertically green line marker always defines the current day. Don't forget to consider it as an indicator when you map your projects.
Let's create our first Initiative that is planned to start on April 8th and finish on April 10th.
Note: For this example, the Timeline is set to display days and the current date is April 7th.
To create an Initiative, you have to right-click or double click on the track area that corresponds to the desired date (check the short video below). This is the Planned Start Date of your Initiative (i.e April 8th). Type the Initiative name to create the item and click "Enter". Move the mouse over the Initiative right edge and click to drag the slider in order to adjust the Planned End date (i.e April 10th) to the Timeline.
With these actions, you just create the Item. The child cards are still not linked to the Timeline initiative.
Note 1: You can manage the time span of Initiative from the Timeline fields.
Open a Timeline Initiative and use the calendar picker to set the dates. The Initiative will adjust its length to match the new dates on the Timeline.
4. How to break down the Timeline Initiative into smaller cards?
When a Timeline Initiative is created, users have to break it down into smaller tasks (deliverables) to define the scope of the project for the team. The deliverables are linked to the Timeline Initiative as child cards and get created on the Cards Workflow or on the Initiatives Workflow. Each child card linked to the Initiatives is represented by a colored rectangle that holds details for the child card/child initiative(on hover). There are various ways to break down the Timeline initiative. One of them is to drag & drop the Initiative to the respective Workflow, just like in the short video below.
The color of the rectangle stands for the current child card position in the Cards workflow:
- if the rectangle is Blue, the child card is "In Requested" column
- if the rectangle is Orange, the child card is "In progress" column
- if the rectangle is Green, the child card is in "Done" column
This is a good visual progress indicator. You can easily see how many of the linked cards are completed; are still in progress or not started yet.
In addition, each Initiative has a Progress Indicator bar (top left corner) that shows in percentage the completed work progress of the smaller tasks that outline its scope. When all child cards up to the lowest level in the hierarchy are moved to “Done” the Initiative will be 100% completed.
Note: if there is a delay, the system will color the Initiative's progress indicator in yellow or red (up to 19% delay, 20%+ delay respectively).
5. How do we know when the Timeline Initiative starts and finishes?
Important: The Timeline initiative will automatically START when any of its child cards go to "In Progress" and FINISH once all of the child cards are moved to Done (100%).
When a card linked to the Initiative goes to "In progress" before the Planned Start date, the Initiative will automatically adjust on-screen to reflect the Actual Start date.
If the planned start date and the actual start date are the same, that will be recorded in the Initiative Timeline fields too.
If a project is running late and the Initiative is behind the Planned end date, the system will mark it with a red line at the top. The days of delay tooltip appears on hover.
The Actual end date of the initiative will be recorded in the respective Timeline field.
6. Can you manually change the "Actual Start date" to a present or past date?
Sometimes your project is subject to a lot of external factors and your plans do not always become a reality. Very often the actual start dates of projects do not correspond to their child cards' start dates.
When a timeline Initiative is "STARTED", only then you can change its Actual start date to match a project timeline beyond the Kanban board processes. You can manually change the Actual start date from the Timeline fields or slide the Initiative’s left edge to the desired actual date.
If none of its child cards are moved to "In progress", the system will not allow you to change that property.
TIP: If the Initiative has no child cards, there are no limitations to change the Actual Start Date.
Note that the Actual Start date is always in the present (Today) or in the past.
7. How to Create Initiatives in the Past?
Please, review the following Scenarios:
Scenario 1: You can create Initiatives in the past to simply visualize past projects.
It means that the Actual Start day and the Actual End date are in the past. The initiatives get partially colored in red to visualize that it was finished at a later time than originally planned (this is default behavior). You can use the Timeline fields to reflect the real situation.
If no delay took place, then open the Initiative and go to Timeline fields.
Use the calendar picker to select a Planned end date that is the same as the Actual End date. The Initiative will no longer indicate delay occurrence.
Scenario 2: Create an Initiative in the past to define its Actual start date and set the Planned end date of the Initiative ahead in the future.
Scenario 3: You have finished a project (100%), which is already in the past, but you haven't estimated its scope properly. Let's assume that you have to link two more tasks that belong to the project and are not started yet. The project duration becomes editable again and you can set a new Planned end date in the future. In case that there are already planned Initiatives in the future, the system will notify you of potential conflict that results in overlapping.
The system will prompt you to choose an action in order to resolve the conflict. You can do any of the following:
Keep current track
All initiatives following the current one will be pushed 1 day in the future.
Add New Track
A new track will be created automatically and the initiative will be moved to it.
8. How do Timeline tracks support your work?
The default Timeline workflow displays a single track to create initiatives in. However, the feature supports unlimited parallel work, which is particularly useful for the planning and execution of concurrent initiatives. When you create your first Initiative, a new track will appear in the Timeline Workflow.
If you want to create another Initiative that is planned to be executed concurrently, you have to use a separate track for its visualization.
If you plan to execute the Initiatives sequentially one after another, you can visualize all them in a single Track. In this case, the system won't let you start working on the next initiative unless the current one has been completed.
9. How to manage the Timeline workflow settings?
When you enable the Timeline workflow, you can manage its settings.
Use the Workflow designer to customize your Timeline Backlog or to add a new Timeline lane.
Use the Timeline settings to define the:
- Lane name: this is the name of the lane as it appears on the Board.
- Number of Tracks: The Timeline Workflows are built with WIP Limits in mind, so you can set a limit on the number of tracks. Thanks to this ability, teams can set a maximum number of concurrent projects or initiatives that can be in progress at the same time.
- Lane Description: it helps users to better understand the intended usage of the lane.
Do not forget to save the Timeline configuration, using the Save button on the top right corner of the screen. Select Back to Board icon to see your new board layout.
To learn more about the Initiatives characteristics themselves, please check the dedicated article.