Use case for timeline layout

Timeline layout helps you plan ahead, meet deadlines, and effectively communicate progress. It provides a bird's-eye view of your work items, allowing you to navigate through the timeline with ease and confidence. Here’s one of many use cases where the timeline layout can be very effective.

Content production and marketing campaigns

The timeline layout can prove invaluable for content production and marketing teams. Let’s consider a board for managing blog production. A set of tasks in this board might be related to creating a new blog post about the benefits of using their company's software. The sequence of actions will include: The content writer drafting the blog, the copyeditor editing it, the manager approving it, and finally the social media manager promoting it on social platforms. 

On converting the above tasks to board items, the timeline layout for this project would look something like this:

Week 1 

1. Research and outline of the blog post (Assignee: Content writer).
2. Blog writing (Assignee: Content writer).

Week 2

1. Blog editing (Assignee: Copyeditor).
2. Blog review and approval (Assignee: Manager).
3. Blog promotion (Assignee: Marketing team).

The statuses associated with these items can be,

• Yet to start
• In progress
• On hold
• Completed

Looking at the timeline representation, the below potential bottlenecks can be identified and avoided.

Dependencies and overlaps -  The timeline layout helps you identify tasks with dependencies. In this use case, each step depends on the preceding step. By visualizing these dependencies, teams can ensure that tasks are sequenced appropriately, avoiding delays and ensuring smooth workflow. 

For example, if the content writer is unable to finish writing the blog post by the end of week 1, the team would need to make adjustments to their original estimated timeline as other upcoming tasks depend on this writing task. 

Resource allocation - The timeline layout reveals potential resource constraints and workload imbalances. When tasks are overcrowded within a specific timeframe, it indicates that teammates might be overallocated. 

For example, if the content writer is overloaded with tasks, the team can reallocate a few tasks to other members, or extend the timelines of low priority tasks to prevent burnout and maintain productivity.

Finally, once the content is approved, the marketing team can take over in promoting the blog post.

Here are a few added benefits of using the timeline layout:

• Increased visibility - The timeline layout provides everyone on the team with a clear view of the content production, which helps in improving communication and collaboration.
• Improved efficiency - By planning out the project in advance, teams can identify and avoid potential bottlenecks or delays.
• Increased accountability - The timeline layout gives a defined structure to project duration and maintains accountability among the team members involved.

Other use cases for timeline layout include: 

• Event planning
• Product development
• Construction
• Manufacturing
• Agile project management