Why You Should Use Trello in 2021

In the first edition of the book, Scrum for Your Life, I described how to use a spreadsheet program to track your Scrum artifacts. In particular the Backlog and Sprint Plan. Since then I’ve switched over to Trello, a free and powerful app, that delivers everything you need to keep your Backlog and run a Sprint.

I’d been using Trello for years for simple lists, like groceries, recipes and movies to watch. But since it is used by some corporations for agile project management, I decided to move over everything I formerly had in spreadsheets to Trello and I couldn’t be happier!

Trello (www.trello.com) is made up of Boards, Lists and Cards. These elements correspond to the spreadsheet equivalent of workbooks, worksheets and cells. But the rich visual options, flexibility and details you can add on Trello far surpass anything you could do in a spreadsheet.

For instance, your Master Backlog would be kept in a Board with Lists corresponding to each of your values. In each value list you will have the goals (in Cards) that support that value. Within each Card, you can add plenty of detail, including photographs, checklist and verbal descriptions. You can also add due date and set reminders, add attachments, and share your goals with other team members.

You’ll have other boards for each of your Sprints. Moving and copying between boards and lists are super easy, and can be done on your phone as easily as your laptop. I suggest that you get started with the app on your laptop, and then download the app to your phone. There are slight differences in the experience, but they are easy to figure out.

After you have done this, play with it to learn some of the features, and feel free to ask me questions about how to use it to achieve your goals in 2021.

Happy New Year!