Never miss Trello card or list updates with this simple trick

Jack Wallen shows how easy it is to follow Trello cards and lists to make sure you don’t miss out on any important updates.

When dealing with a very active Trello board associated with a big project, there’s always a chance you might miss an update to either a card or a full list of cards. The end result of that could make the difference between you getting work done on time or falling behind on a project.

Seeing as how the whole reason for project management solutions exist is to keep you and your teams on track with your projects, you don’t want that. So, when a team member misses out on a card (or list) update, things could domino out of control.

To avoid this, you need to make sure your teammates know how to follow individual cards or whole lists of cards.

When following either a card or list you’ll be notified of specific events, according to what you’re following:

• Card: Comments, changes in due dates, moving, adding and archiving
• List: Comments, changes in due dates, moving, adding, archiving and if a new card is added

This feature should be a must-use for any card or list that is crucial to a team member’s productivity on the project. And, best of all, it’s not only built into Trello, it’s available to all plans (both free and paid).

SEE: Hiring kit: Project manager (TechRepublic Premium)

How to watch a single Trello card

First, we’ll deal with individual cards. This particular option is best when you need to follow a card that might be in a list you don’t usually keep track of or a list you do watch but for which you don’t need constant updates on every card listed.

To follow a single card in a list, open that card for viewing and you should see a Watch button under Actions on the right side of the card (Figure A).

Click Watch to follow the card. When you see the green box with the white checkmark, you know you’re watching that card.

If ever you find you no longer need to watch that card, go back and undo the action.

How to watch an entire list

To watch an entire Trello board list, locate the list in question and click the meatball menu in the upper right corner to reveal the List Actions menu (Figure B).

From that menu, click Watch, and you should then see a small eye icon directly to the left of the menu button for that list (Figure C).

And there you have it—a simple way to ensure you don’t miss any updates to either a single card or a complete list. Know that you can watch multiple cards in a single list if you don’t want to follow the entire list. Either way, you can be sure you will always be in the know of whatever is going on with your Trello cards and lists.

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