Blueprints are a template for quickly creating tasks in Wrike, you create a task, folder, or project blueprint
Blueprints should be created for all standard H&D Products and Tasks.
These are used by PMs, Success and any team member to quickly create new projects, jobs and individual tasks.
Blueprint Folder Structure
- A folder should be created for each Product and Product Tier
- The Folders should be added to the relevant Stream / Centre of Excellence folder
Folder Naming
- Should reflect the name of the Product within the H&D HubSpot portal
- Follow this format: | {Product Name} - when a new project or job is created from the Blueprint the job 6CODE will be added to the beginning of the project/folder name
- Although you are reflecting the product name, you should try to abbreviate and shorten as much as possible, e.g. & rather than and, KB rather than Knowledge Base, PM rather than Project Management, etc
Blueprint Tasks
Define Products
- Before creating your Blueprint you should map your end-to-end delivery process and define your individual product and product tiers.
- These products and product tiers should be added as a Product Folder and Individual Products within the H&D HubSpot portal.
Task Planning
- Create a task for each step/action within your process.
- Try to limit blueprint tasks to 5 points or less, ideally 3 points or less.
- Try to ensure each task can be completed within a Sprint period / 1 week.
Task Naming
- The task name should include the parent folder name
- Should reflect the item from the Product Description within the H&D HubSpot portal or rows from the H&D | Products | Definition
- Follow this format: | {Product Name} | {Task} - when a new task is created from the Blueprint the job 6CODE will be added to the beginning of the task name
- Each name should be unique
- Use the Pipe character/| to split out tasks to be more granular and unique;
- e.g. | PM | Week 1, | PM | Week 2
- e.g. | Sales | Session: Design Workshop 1, | Sales | Session: Design Workshop 2, | Sales | Session: Design Workshop 1 | Support
- Although you are reflecting the product and task name, you should try to abbreviate and shorten as much as possible, e.g. & rather than and, KB rather than Knowledge Base, PM rather than Project Management, etc
Task Point Management
- Enter the Budget and Actual points for each task - based on the H&D | Products | Definition
- Note you will likely have more than one Task per line - in this case do a relevant split of the points across all of the points you create
- All Project and Success Blueprint Tasks should have Budget and Actual points defined, with a minimum of 0.1 point per task
- The sum of Budget points for the product should equal or be slightly lower than the overall product budget
- You may want to have the Actual points for some tasks to be lower than the Budget, e.g. for sessions that are likely to have actions that need to be tracked and monitored - this allows for individuals to create additional subtasks for actions out of the back of another task which they can enter their actual on without having to split the original budget
Task Contents
You can copy generic tasks from this blueprint folder to get you started.
General Tasks should include:
- Task Description
- Story
- This provides context to why we are doing this task to help the person completing the task, you can have the same story across multiple related tasks.
- As {person}
I want {this feature}
So that {I can get this benefit}
- Acceptance Criteria
- Use acceptance criteria to highlight key steps in the process, requirements and quality assurance
- Acceptance criteria should be written as a statement as if you were checking something to be done
- e.g.
A personalised message is displayed when viewing the page
NOT
A personalised message should be displayed when viewing the page
- e.g.
- Outcome
- Include deliverable name for output so it can be linked
- Story
- Other Fields
- Assignee: Assign to the relevant generic resource user, e.g. Resource Marketing Lead (note all generic resource users should exist for all core roles, all start with 'Resource')
- The generic resources are:
- Success & Commercial
- Resource | AM
- Resource | Solutions Analyst
- Resource | Commercial
- Success & Commercial
-
-
- Marketing
- Resource | Marketing Lead
- Resource | Campaign Manager
- Resource | UX
- Resource | Content
- CRM
- Resource | CRM
- Solutions
- Resource | Solutions
- Resource | Data
- Dev & CMS
- Resource | Custom Dev
- Resource | CMS
- PM & Setup
- Resource | PM
- Resource | Project Admin
- Resource | Setup
- Marketing
-
-
- Budget & Actual Points: Should be completed for all tasks
- Resource Type: Should be completed for all tasks
- Set date duration as 5 days
- Set Dependencies (only within the current folder), i.e. previous tasks that need to be completed before, at the same time, etc - this will make it much easier for PMs and AMs to schedule larger volumes of work
- Milestone: Use where relevant, i.e. cutover, approval of a key deliverable
- Non-billable: Use where relevant, i.e. internal tasks
Ordering Tasks Tip
Setting Predecessors, dates, etc, can be a bit painful to do in Wrike, but if you follow these steps everything should be much cleaner and easier.
- Clear any dates that are on your Tasks
- Show the Gantt Chart View in your Blueprint Folder / Project
- Select Gantt manual order (for the sort order)
- Display columns in the Gantt Chart View (click cog): Name, Resource, Predecessors, Duration (remove everything else)
- Reorder items to flow appropriately
- Ensure Duration is set to 5d for all tasks
- Enter predecessors
Task Maintenance
Anyone in the team should feel empowered to update blueprints to continuously improve our quality.
This should be a key action from retrospectives.
Try to work to Romi's rule: if you need to add or change something 3 times - you should update your template.
Useful Links
- Blueprints in Wrike
- Creating a Task Blueprint
- Creating a Folder or Project Blueprint
- Saving a Task as a Blueprint
- Saving a Folder or Project as a Blueprint