More on subtasks

In this release of Outlook, we considered adding subtasks, but decided that the primary problem that our customers are facing is that they don’t use tasks at all. Some might argue that this is because tasks in Outlook lack the hierarchy and sophisticated linking that some time management philosophies call for, but what we found in our research was quite the opposite: tasks were already too complicated, they were hidden away in an infrequently visited section of the product, they didn’t interact well with the calendar, and generally, they were too hard to use. We also found that less than 2% of our customers ever used tasks. We found this statistic to be incredibly sad given how badly people need better time management tools. To help our customers, we decided to focus on making tasks more prominent (the To-Do Bar), improve task interaction with the calendar (the Daily Task List) and most importantly, make tasks easy to create (easy task entry in the To-Do Bar and new task flagging.) Simplicity won out over additional hierarchy and complexity. Perhaps next release we will consider enhancing tasks to include subtasks and better hierarchical structuring to build on the system that we have built in this release. Thank you all for your comments.

Comments

• Anonymous
  January 26, 2006
  Thanks for taking your time to post an explanation.
• Anonymous
  January 26, 2006
  good thing you changed the name. tasks are just way too advanced.
  
  The thing is that if you start something really simple, the only people to really admire how advance tasks become are the people who are using it from the beginning. everyone else will be left out.
  
  google sidebar in desktop search has this really cool plugin: to-do plugin. it really is simple and prominent. I like the interactivity of it. unfortunately, desktop search takes lots of resources.
  
  i saw tasks in outlook, tried to use it, was not much of a time management person so i never really liked it. i tried hard to use it to. but if you give people the option of not having a deadline and just having a list of to-do items, they will appreciate it more.
• Anonymous
  January 27, 2006
  Interesting statistics. Was there an analysis of WHY 98% of those surveyed didn't use Outlook tasks? Or formal HCI research watching them use tasks?
  
  I'm certainly one of those that has tried to use Outlook tasks in every new version of Office and abandonded them as just not meeting my needs(I went back to paper each time). I am in the 30 day trial phase of using the Netcentric Outlook GTD-add in.
  http://www.davidco.com/store/catalog/Getting-Things-Done-Outlook-Add-In-by-Netcentrics-p-16156.php
  
  It has Projects and Subprojects, I can sort by them for views and expand/collaspe a hierarchical list in the project and subproject view.
  So far it looks very promising and I will likely buy it, though I'm going to try out Gyronix ResultsManager with MindManager and see how well it integrates with Outlook 2003, and if mind mapping works for me.
  
  I never found the Franklin/Covey single daily task list with priorities a very useful approach for me. The context based Next Action approach of GTD seem to be working better, and handles the constant flow of interrupts, shifting focuses, priorities etc. better. I mesh the contexts with Julie Morgenstern's time map and only look at to-do's that fit in the context or time slot I've allocated. Maybe a two level sort, daily list that I can impose a secondary context sort on would work.
  
  I'm also using OneNote and then have links to everything else relating to a task in the OneNote entry. It's a kludge but it's working.
  
  I don't so much think of it as a sophisticated approach as much as doing the foundation/prep work that makes the to-do as simple as possible when I get to it. That I am at the most granualar level to do a task, i.e. all the info, docs, websites etc. are right there.
  
  Obviously, it's a very individual thing and different things work for different people. I would urge that how the task list is displayed can be configured by the user so that they are not limited to displaying tasks by a daily view.
  
  Currently, I have the task list displayed in my calendar view, though I pretty much ignore it, and rely on a separate Outlook task window with the tasks displayed by GTD action (context) or by project/subproject.
  
  I look forward to playing with the new calendar functionality which looks awesome.
• Anonymous
  January 27, 2006
  I live and breath in Outlook. Is there any chance at all of getting into the Beta? I'd love to be able to test and give some feed back on these features.
  
  email: patrickforum at allaboutfocus dot com.
  
• Anonymous
  January 29, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  January 30, 2006
  Since sub-tasks won't be appearing in Outlook 12, how about making a add-in for it? If the add-in is popular, as I imagine it will be with all the GTD users, then you can integrate it into Outlook 13 or Outlook 12 SP1.
  
• Anonymous
  January 31, 2006
  hi melissa,
  firstly, i very much appreciate the opportunity to be able to be able to provide feedback on this forum.
  Following on from your note, I do most definitely agree that integrating the tasklist more closely into the calendar is fundamental to getting more people to use the task facility, and it sounds as if this aspect will be much improved in the new Outlook version.
  However, I also think that hierarchical tasks are now a necessity in this day and age, particularly if Outlook is to be perceived as the market-leading tool for organising our lives. (As you point out, ms-project can certainly handle subtasks, but i don't necessarily concur with the view that humanity be confronted with the prospect of learning ms-project just so that they can have sub-tasks).
  In summary, the new version of outlook sounds good, i think it'll look cool, i will probably find some of the enhancements useful, but (....) without major improvements in productivity, i find it unlikely that i would advocate upgrading to the newest version of outlook.
  This was a potential easy win for microsoft - nonetheless, i'm guessing there are a number of small software companies who'll be celebrating your omission as they swiftly write a nice little plug-in.
  c'est la vie.
  regards,
  m.
  
• Anonymous
  February 07, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  February 07, 2006
  Give to-do's a "floating" option.
  Floating to-do's ala Palm's datebk 5.
  If I don't get it done today it automagically moves to the next day in the same time slot.
• Anonymous
  February 12, 2006
  Melissa,
  
  Chris White is soooo right.
  
  E-mail centrism is Outlook's fatal flaw.
  
  Well, perhaps from a Real-Politik viewpoint, email-centrism is no bug at all, but a supercool feature.
  
  Really, truly, we vote with our feet.
  
  If the goal is to drive away the Next-Action customer-base, you couldn't be more on target.
  
  Sorry, just mumbling to myself.
  
  You're bidness model is raking in billions.
  
  Better keep on keeping on the same track.
• Anonymous
  February 13, 2006
  Why do I not like the tasks in Outlook? The greatest problem for me is that owner of owerdued task assigned to can change due date and send a report and his boss has no ability to see a original due date (his copy of task is updated, when he opens a status mail). What about to add a new checkbox "Save a copy of assigned task" or a history of changes in a new textbox?
  
  Best regards
  
  
  tb at ina dot sk
• Anonymous
  February 20, 2006
  I agree wholeheartedly with most of the posters in this thread (specifically Tim, Martin, and Chris White) - I was extremely disappointed to learn of the lack of sub-tasks in Outlook 12 and it is the main reason I don't use it now for overall task management. Project is no small-scale substitute for what should be in Outlook.
  
  And on another note - would it be so difficult to have a prioritizing/display algorithm that when sorted by due date, puts tasks without due dates at the TOP, followed by due soonest, ending in due latest? Can I be the only person in the world that has items who's due date is not specific, but rather ASAP? I want to see these followed by 'what's coming next', and YOU CAN'T DO THIS IN OUTLOOK! (sorry).
  
  Also, using an algorithm, it would be nice (read: invaluable) to be able to sort a task list and still be able to drag/drop to re-order the tasks and have that new order kept as the sort order for that view. Without re-digging this all up, the way it works now is as soon as you change a view or pick one that has a sort or a group-by, you CANNOT drag/drop to set the order. Hello - Microsoft employs smart programmers, and being one, there are several ways to do this behind the scenes. I want to filter tasks based on a particular category, etc. and still drag them around to customize the order and have it retained.
  
  I realize it's probably way too late for this, but I sent this feedback many many months ago, and it would appear these features are very much a minority, which I find hard to believe for those that have tried to use tasks regularly.
  
  Anyway, here's hoping someone is listening...
  
• Anonymous
  February 21, 2006
  I suggest you integrate features like the ones in the Getting Things Done toolbar addin from David Allen.  It would be SO much easier for others to use tasks efficiently if you had that type of functionality that enabled people to convert emails to tasks and appointments with a click and archive/preserve the original email in a special folder linked to the new item.  Why didn't you guys think of this?  It seems only logical that people will want to do this with email they receive and it makes total sense to me...
• Anonymous
  February 25, 2006
  Make tasks like this:
  The calendat is the central time manager.
  So, make tasks a kind of note in the Calendar. It has an end date and time (deadline). It could have an start date and time.
  By default the start time is Today() and Now().
  Each hour, or 30 min (depending on the resolution of your calendar) it moves over to the next available time space, if it is not completed.
  If I start working on it, I rightclick the item and select 'Start'. If I pause, I select 'pause'. When completed, I click 'comleted'
  Thus the task will 'float' with time.
• Anonymous
  March 02, 2006
  AAAARGH!
  
  "In this release of Outlook, we considered adding subtasks, but decided that the primary problem that our customers are facing is that they don’t use tasks at all."
  
  And why don't people like me use them? Because my need for cross-granularity integration that subtasking offers as tasks scale upwards in their "subsumption capacity", is not met in any program on the planet. The problem isn't that I don't use Tasks in Outlook. The problem is that I don't use anyone's solution for "tasks" because no one has one.
  
  Until I can do a Gantt for my Tasks, I'll remain a miserable sot.  ;-)
• Anonymous
  March 31, 2006
  I believe the reason people dont use tasks is that they arent CONSTANTLY in front of them.  You need an option that lets me show my tasks from Outlook on the desktop or better, in a docked sidebar. This way I am constantly reminded what my tasks are.
• Anonymous
  April 05, 2006
  The reason I don't use Outlook tasks is they don't fit the way I work.
  
  Outlook doesn't allow me to order tasks quickly and easily. Each morning when I come in, I organize my to-do list in Word, by ordering my tasks in the exact order in which I'll complete them.
  
  Until and unless Outlook supports drag & drop to quickly set an exact order of tasks, I doubt I'll ever use it.
• Anonymous
  April 05, 2006
  DaveT,
  
  I think you will be happy to discover that you can easily drag & drop tasks into your desired order in the next version of Outlook. (And in the right view, in all previous versions of Outlook too.)
  
  -Melissa
• Anonymous
  April 09, 2006
  I agree that it is sad that Tasks are not used -- I too found them too complicated and not being able to freely set priorities and place them in any order I deem appropriate is the real problem.  But I expect that the proposed improvements will make it all happen. Thanks!
• Anonymous
  April 17, 2006
  Melissa, is complexity really the reason why a subtask feature wasn't added to Outlook 12?  Isn't UI, not limited functionality the best way to address this complexity?
  
  Not to be mistrustful of what you're saying, but wouldn't creating sublists undercut the Project market?  Doesn't this have a lot to do with the intentional limitations on functionality?  
  
  I use the task list extensively with a fair amount of sophistication but there's something very important missing.  Subcategories would greatly enhance my ability to organize my time and track longer, project based tasks.  Microsoft Project is overkill for a personal task list.  For a sole proprietor like me neither Project nor Outlook Tasks really provides the right solution.
  
  I understand the need to maintain separate markets for extended functionality, but my suspicion is that a lot of end users--like me--fall in the gap in between.
  
  And Scott, regarding your hope for Gantt in Outlook Tasks, I can almost guarantee that you will never ever see this level of project tracking sophistication in Outlook.  Gantt is one of the primary functions of MS Project.  I can think of no better way for Microsoft to pull the legs out from under the Project Standard than to provide Gantt functionality to all managers who have Outlook.
• Anonymous
  April 29, 2006
  As a team manager i work and live in my outlook.
  I plan my day and my projects on the calendar.
  1.unfortunatly Tasks are not shown in the calendar, even though they do take time(after all we start doing them at a certain point of the day,end finish them after a while just like an appointmnet)
  2. There is also no easy way of updating the Status or Length of the task, I would have loved if you could set a task to PAUSE/PLAY without manually entering its End Date.
  3.If there was also a way to show the task in a Public Calendar it would be a killer, for it will allow a higher look on the Project Calendaric Status from an integrated View.
  4. I tried to use MS-Project, but because it can't Sync with Each team member available Time (which they each handle in their calendars) all the plannig in the world became meanningless, and couldn't give real estimates to Projects Length.
  But if Tasks would have been More usable and more intuitive then they would have become popular.
  5. I also agree with the sugestion to allow the creation of Tasks From Emails/Appointments and Vice-Versa (why am i forced to create a Task prior to deciding when i want to do it ?! there should be no such limitation)
• Anonymous
  April 29, 2006

1. Tasks should be allowed to Create from the Calendar by Creating them from appointments.
   
   2. Tasks should be able to PLAY/PAUSE, by this allowing the tasks status/End Date to be automatically updated as long as it is not Marked as finished.
   
   3. Tasks MUST HAVE HIERARCHY, without this ability there is no Reason for Using them (and categories just don't cut it).
   
   4.Show tasks in Private/Public Calendars.
   
   5. Links them to Mails/Appointments/Documents/Urls/Etc.
   
   6.Task Must have a distinction between Planned and Real Start/End Date + Planned/Real Durations and a visual way to show this information on the Calendar

• Anonymous
  May 29, 2006
  (must, 1st rel.) 1. Integrate with the Calendar
  
  (must, 1st rel.) 2. Let me tie a task (1 or more) to a calendar appt.
  
  (should, 1st rel.) 3. Split the 5-day view in Calendar so that for each day in the work week, I can also see the tasks assigned for that day.
  
  (must, 2nd rel.) 4. Allow me to group 1 or more tasks under a particular "goal" heading.
  
  (nice to have) 5. Click a button to start/stop a timer for a particular task.
  
  My own 2 cents.
  

• Anonymous
  June 12, 2006
  So you are saying that 98% of people don't use tasks in Outlook because it doesn't have the features they need, and you won't add the new features they need because only 2% of people use tasks in Outlook?
  
  The reason why I don't use Outlook is lack of features, namely subtasks and projects.  Unless you are doing a simple list of household items to do, Outlook is useless for managing tasks and projects.  Perhaps that is why only 2% of people use it.
  
  This is specifically WHY you need to add subtasks.  So that it is actually useful for people who have a lot to do.

• Anonymous
  June 16, 2006
  I agree with Tdavis' suggestion, I found this site searching for a timer plugin of some type for outlook.
  
  The 'journal' feature allows this but the integration between tasks, journal and calendar is really bad.
  
  Basically journal should record the time spent on  each task. And calendar should automagically make entries for each task.
  
  I think the complexity aries from the fact that there are way too many fields in tasks.

• Anonymous
  June 25, 2006
  I agree that the complexity aries from the fact that there are way too many fields in tasks... partially.
  
  The problem is NOT the number of fields.  They are needed for many complex tasks and should be there.  There just needs to be a simple less intimidating way of entering items for people who do not need all the functionality.  And there needs to be better ways to actually display and organize the tasks (i.e. into projects, subtasks, etc.).
  
  Examples of good user interfaces for project/task managers are Achieve Planner (
  http://www.effexis.com/achieve/planner.htm ) and Lotus Organizer ( http://www-142.ibm.com/software/sw-lotus/products/product2.nsf/wdocs/orghome ).  Lotus is good for simple daily todo lists but not good for project management, while Achieve Planner is better at managing projects and their related tasks.
  
  I had to stop using Lotus Organizer because my task list was getting too complicated (i.e. I needed to see tasks by project and needed to be able to group like tasks together using subtasks).  Outlook was never considered an option because it didn't handle tasks well at all.
  
  Hopefully the new improvements will help, but without projects and subtasks, I will have to use some other program to manage tasks. like I do now.
  
  

• Anonymous
  June 28, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 01, 2006
  Just a "me too" on I have tried to use tasks in Outlook with every version and abandoned it because of my need to subcategorize.  
  
  The problem with simpler versions that omit such detail, is that todo lists become gargantuan with no effective way to select one of the items with a medium priority and a due date of this month!
  
  I love MS Office for how intuitive and customizable it is!  Accolades and then some!  But Oulook needs to step up to the plate.  No one is out there looking for a better word processor.  But just look at the activity surrounding finding a way to manage to-do's.  Come on Microsoft -- do that wonderful thing you do!  Make it simple, customizable, exhaustive, innovative -- make the industry standard!

• Anonymous
  July 04, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 05, 2006
  I too have tried to use outlook tasks and it is simply not functional enough.  I can't order my tasks other than 3 priority levels.  I've ALWAYS thought from the beginning that outlook has needed subtasks.  Badly.  You even went so far as to make some collaboration on the tasking by allowing people to assign tasks to each other, but you left out subtasking.  

• Anonymous
  July 06, 2006
  It is really sad to read, that Microsoft ignores the requirements of the majority of their customers in respect to tasks, only (so it seems) because they are afraid to cannibalize one of their other products (Project).
  
  The answer can only be: someone else must come up with a competetive product that fulfills all these needs. I guess competition is something that MS still responds to (as opposed to customer requirements).
  
  Ideally it would be an Opensource project, so that many people can get involved and provide ideas and resources.

• Anonymous
  July 15, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 15, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  August 02, 2006
  I found this site by searching for "hierarchical tasks outlook" too, just like many other people.  The demand is certainly there, and I'm pretty sure subtasks/task hierarchy are one of the most, if not the most wanted feature in outlook.  If your research has shown that only 2% of outlook users use tasks, the best way to boost that percentage is to add a subtask feature. Just look at this thread for a sample estimate of the demand; it's what most people here are asking for.

• Anonymous
  August 19, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  August 30, 2006
  Yes, I'm another user super disappointed to learn sub-tasks will not be added to Outlook. It does preclude Outlook from being used as a project managing tool and therefore I agree with a previous poster that it may be that it's done for marketing reasons.  

• Anonymous
  October 13, 2006
  Just want to make sure you haven't forgotten about sub tasks.  I was also searching on "hierarchical tasks outlook" Ihave been looking and came across this page - sad that its not there in relase 12

• Anonymous
  October 18, 2006
  Hey you! I am looking for some good scenarios around lightweight project management (hierarchical task

• Anonymous
  January 11, 2007
  Hello all, Thanks for all the enlightening discussion on subtasks.  I googled "outlook subtasks" and ended up here.  Just wanted to add my voice that I belong to those 2% of people who need subtasks. Thanks, NT.

• Anonymous
  February 28, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  February 28, 2007
  Andrew, Thanks for the feedback. Here is a hacky trick to get "undated" tasks to go to the bottom of list: Move them to the far future.

1. Take an undated task and set the due date/start date to 100 years in the future. This will create a new group called "Later"
2. Drag all of your other "undated" tasks to that group. -Melissa

• Anonymous
  March 25, 2007
  Subtasks are a requirement.  Until this is added to Outlook, I have to buy/use yet another program.   Thank you Microsoft for making my computer require more memory.

• Anonymous
  May 17, 2007
  Hello, breaking tasks into sub-tasks is a fundamental way that people are accustomed to do. But people may not be aware of it themselves. If Outlook gives the hierarchical task facility and also gives it a more prominent area, it will definitely be a great success for both the customers and microsoft.

• Anonymous
  May 24, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  May 29, 2007
  In addition if anyone from MS is listening... To further simulate in Outlook what I (and others) do with pen and paper, I constantly have to manually add task reminders to followup on contact entry such as "get home address" or "update email address".  Having this automated feature within outlook (call it sticknote automation) would be great.  Doubleclick the field in any dialog and bring up a sticky that adds itself to the to-do list and categorizes itself based on where the note was spawned.  So, for my example, double-clicking in the address field of my business contact would bring up a sticky that would autofill the category as "contact info update" and ask for the reminder period.  

• Anonymous
  June 15, 2007
  Here's a method of creating projects, linked to tasks/emails/whatever based on modifying the contacts template: http://home.comcast.net/~whkratz/id3.htm Personally I'm using tasks by dragging emails to create the task.  I've got tasks arranged by category, and I've added another field in tasks for numbering each task (I changed the task view to be editable without opening each task).  Unfortunately the numbers don't update, so I have to renumber when reviewing my list.  I've also added another field with "next step."  It's working for now, but it's not ideal.  Subtasks/hierarchy in Outlook would be better, or possibly that method in the URL above for now.

• Anonymous
  September 30, 2007
  I just made another attempt at trying to use Outlook/Onenote for tasks and projects, and gave up once again. The problem is lack of integration and lack of flexibility. Outlook 2007 adds some flexibility but not nearly enough to make tasks truly useful. Tasks need hierarchy, fields for sorting, and easily accessible custom views. I have pages of notes on this, and they are all attempts to work around limitations in outlook/onenote. I still use Ecco for many things, which has been abandoned since 1997. While it has some serious limitations, the basic premise is much more powerful than what we have available today in Outlook.

• Anonymous
  October 15, 2007
  Your statistics might be right, but the basis is probably wrong.  As they stand, tasks are basically useless for all but simplest of projects.  It would be so much easier for people to use the tool if they could use it to plan out a small project.   The culture of most companies does not yet allow people to email tasks to one another and expect them to get done.  Making the tool less powerful seems to only hurt the cause.

• Anonymous
  December 11, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  December 12, 2007
  Maria, Thank you for your comments. Your comments reflect the feeling of many people on this blog. As I have done with all of the comments that I have received on this post, I have forwarded it on to the wider product team. Thank you, Melissa

• Anonymous
  December 13, 2007
  Thanks Melissa, I know it can be a long road and you have to balance the input from a lot of people. That's just my two (and a big half) bits! Things I DO like are things like how I can sync both iCal and my Outlook Calender via Google Calender etc. This kind of thing is flexible and in the right direction for people like me. Best, Maria

• Anonymous
  December 29, 2007
  Melissa (and et. al.) -- I too, for many, many years, have shared the frustrations expressed by Maria and others - so much so I decided to fix them! I'm pleased to say we finally have Version 1 out of Foresight, our add-in for Outlook that gives it the hierarchical tasks abilities it needs, and more.  Version 1 is at www.FixYourToDoList.com - a version that has been in the works for about as long as this blog entry!  ;-)  Seriously, though, I think we have a winner here and I wanted to convey my thanks to Melissa for this blog as it has been a motivator and validation for us (and me).  Also, a big thanks for Outlook 2007 - it is a nice breath of fresh air and continues a great synergy between people looking for personal productivity solutions, Microsoft, and developers like us! Happy New Year's, everyone! -- Jeffrey W. Cox

• Anonymous
  January 05, 2008
  PingBack from http://birthdays.247blogging.info/?p=1680

• Anonymous
  March 04, 2008
  Hello, I agree with everyone above. Outlook needs subtasks to be a viable solution. Please keep pushing for this everyone, show your support for this feature, be heard, and eventually it will happen! (hopefully) Cheers, Colin

• Anonymous
  April 01, 2008
  Yep. I searched "hierachical task list" and "outlook subtasks" Hey Microsoft, you should ask google how many people are searching for these things... Oh wait, Google are probably about to dominate this market with their new task prog coming soon. Ha haaaa

• Anonymous
  May 31, 2008
  Thank you all for your comments. At this time, this blog post is being closed for comments and I am no longer posting updates for the moment. To see what is going now in Outlook, see: http://blogs.msdn.com/outlook. Thank you all and we really do appreciate the feedback, even the negative feedback. -Melissa