S1. Ep23 - How AI Can Transform Your Task Management

Katie: Welcome to the AI Automations for Business Podcasts. We're your hosts, Katie and Null, and we'll be discussing how you can use AI for your business along with the latest news, updates and automations to help you stay ahead of the curve, allowing you to grow and scale your business more efficiently. Please be sure to subscribe

Noel: and I hope you enjoy this episode.

Katie: Hello, welcome back to another episode. Hello, hi, I'm Katie. and I've got Noel here with me. Hello. Hi.

Noel: How are you doing now? Oh, spectacular this week.

Katie: So this week we're talking all things, task management and project management. So for those of us running businesses, there is a lot to do. There's a lot of tasks to remember, a lot of organisation, deadlines, all sorts. And sometimes it's, it's actually really hard to keep, you know, on top of tasks, even with the most best intentions, even if we are using project task manager tools like Asana or Notion, Trello, things like that, it can still be quite overwhelming. It's actually one of the things that I sometimes find really overwhelming. And sometimes when you're looking at all the tasks that need to be done as well, it's kind of like, where do I start first, actually, what needs doing first? And actually, this can use up a lot of time. It can, you know, go into time that could have been tackling these tasks. So, Noel, what can we do to help with this task management and also project management?

Noel: So what we can do is to kind of offload your tasks onto AI. So we can let AI know what we're doing and then it can figure things out and then kind of point you in the right direction as well.

Katie: I mean, that sounds amazing, straight off. Absolutely.

Noel: Yeah, I need to set that up for us.

Katie: Yeah.

Noel: So there's also all the things where, you know, we can maybe have agents and things that that we talk to and say, well, look, you know, can you add these tasks to my list. Here's my note taker. I add this to the list and things that. So there's all kinds of stuff that we can do to automate your task management. Yeah.

Katie: So I know we've talked about AI note takers, you know, in previous episodes. So perhaps this isn't a business or a person who is part of a team or tasks haven't come from a meeting, but they're just everyday tasks that someone in business has to go through, they've not been delegated, they've not been given out in a meeting. You just know that these are tasks that you need to do. Maybe their daily tasks, maybe they're weekly, maybe they're monthly, quarterly, but you know that these tasks have to be done, completed. But no one's kind of delegating those tasks out to you. Like, I feel like this is where a lot of business owners really struggle with.

Noel: Definitely, yeah. So we handle all of our stuff ourselves. So, yeah, there's a lot for us to do. So I guess even, you know, you could bake into the AI. So with the AI that looks at your tasks in your task management tool, you could tell it the date. And then you could bake in those quarterly dates. So it's like, don't forget to submit your VAT return. That's due. you know, in this month, you know, you can input all of that information. So then when you do get your reports and things out from AI, it can also incorporate those as well. And that's just a thought I just had there. And I'm probably going to put that into our system. So as we finish this podcast.

Katie: Yeah, the VAT return, that is definitely a task for you, please.

Noel: Definitely, yeah.

Katie: So actually, it's worth taking some time. and populating your task management with your, like, to-do list or with your tasks and actually then letting AI help you with it. But what if you're, like, actually that's the first hurdle you're actually struggling with? Because I know people who are neurodivision, you know, really struggle with actually just putting those tasks in a task management app like is there a way round that instead of having to sit there and go you know send email to blah blah blah reply to i

Noel: i guess there there is i mean you could um you can have to input some sort of data at some point but you could put these sort of things in chat jvete and say well look this is the kind of business i'm running can you create me some tasks that i should be doing or whatever and things that and then export that and then put that into your so your AI agent that you talk to and that has access to all of your areas and it will go off and then correct those tasks for you within your within whatever database that you're currently using so that could be one way around it i guess Yeah,

Katie: and I've actually done that. So I asked ChatGPT to create me like a weekly schedule because I'm not the best that keep into schedules. And I really wanted to kind of like know exactly like when I'm sat at my desk, like things that I need to do rather than like what I

Noel: want to do or,

Katie: like impulsive to do so it was kind of like I needed like almost some order some schedule and actually I told chat GPT like everything that I need to do in a week all of the tasks that I need to complete like how long I take for my lunch break what hours I work in you know I don't work on a Friday or I take an extra long lunch break on I don't know what on a Wednesday and I put all of that in and that actually then created me like a weekly schedule and then I guess from there you can then ask it to create the tasks within those like time slots that you actually need to complete yeah

Noel: yeah definitely yeah you can easily do that yeah you should I mean I don't think every task that it all suggests might be exactly spot on, but you'll have to do some edited.

Katie: Yes, but I feel like once you've kind of got that, outline that, almost like the skeleton of it, it almost then becomes easier then to go, okay, actually during this time slot that it's recommended, I need to you know, I'm going to reply to emails or I'm going to send emails or and then in this content creation time block I know that I've got to write an email to my email subscribers or you know I've got to write Instagram posts for the week ahead something like that

Noel: yeah that makes sense yeah yeah because it should be able to I mean ChatsypT will be able to easily figure out those sort of tasks wouldn't it and be able to put those in a nice neat neat neat in order for you so yeah yeah yeah it's kind of thing getting them into like a tool because obviously it's It's one thing having that in Church of BT, but you kind of do need to migrate that to something else because there's no currently, I'm sure Sam Altman and the team are probably working on it, but there's no way of then like ticking them off to say, yeah, I've done those, tick it off, move on.

Katie: And ticking things off is like the best thing.

Noel: Yes.

Katie: It just feels so good.

Noel: Yes, I enjoyed ticking some stuff off on our whiteboard about 10 minutes ago.

Katie: You even bought the green. whiteboard pen I did.

Noel: I did, yeah.

Katie: I really like it in Asana because when you tick a task off in Asana, like this unicorn comes riding in on a rainbow, like to celebrate it. And there's other like little things that fly in if it's not the unicorn. And that's really fun. Like that really appeals to me. But I know, you know, there are other platforms to use, because this is something that I used to get asked a lot, like, what platform do you use, you know, for tasks management and for productivity? And there is no wrong or right answer. It's whatever one works for you. So even Noel and I like using different productivity, you know, apps. No, you really like notion.

Noel: I do, yes.

Katie: Yeah, whereas I really like Asana.

Noel: I do need to have a look at that one actually.

Katie: Yeah. And it's not that one's better than the other. It's literally what you prefer and which one works best for the way you work for your brain as well. So I know there are lots of lovely notion templates out there but even like the the cutest nicest template cannot get my brain to work alongside Nation and this is something that I've really had to like learn about myself as well it's not just use this platform and does it have all the automations that I require from it but it's also am I actually going to use it because I think that It's the most important thing.

Noel: Yes, because I remember I created our task listed notion. And I was like, are you even looking at this? You're like, no.

Katie: Do you know what? I don't think I've clicked on that link since the day you sent it to me. Because I was like, I just don't enjoy using Notion. Like it just doesn't work for my brain at all. No.

Noel: That's fair enough.

Katie: And I think a lot of people think as well that these task management or productivity apps don't work for them, it might be just that you haven't found the right one for you. And thankfully now there are so many different ones. So I would say find the right one for you and then be okay with using it, get used to using it. And then that's when you're like, right, okay, let's start automating it. Would you agree with that, no? Yeah, definitely, yeah.

Noel: Yeah, you do need to make sure you can automate it, obviously.

Katie: Yeah, I mean, I think with most of them now, you probably can

Noel: use automations

Katie: within them.

Noel: Yeah, I think some might block access to the API at a certain payment level, so that's something to watch out for. Most of them don't, I don't think, but yeah, some of the rogue ones, they might put it on like a pro-tier kind of thing, not a start-old. to plan, yeah.

Katie: What about if someone just wants to use like a good old fashion Google sheet?

Noel: Oh, easy.

Katie: Yeah. That's easy to automate.

Noel: Yeah. Oh, that's, you can have that in make.com any day of the week.

Katie: I was wondering how long it was going to take you to make.

Noel: Yeah, 12 minutes. Right.

Katie: So if people are like, well, I'm just a person that loves the good old fashion spreadsheet. So you could use a Google sheet and Excel, I assume?

Noel: Yes, it's going to be the Office 365 version, I believe. You could get access to it remotely. A standalone spreadsheet on your PC is not going to, that's not going to cut the mustard.

Katie: Okay, that's good to know. So there are like basic options for those people as well who might not want to pay for a task management app or productivity app. there are options with Microsoft 360 and Google Sheets. And I know there's lots of free options as well like there. Like there's a free Nation option, Asana, Trello, I believe there's a free version as well. I won't go into all of them because there are so many and I haven't even heard of all of them. No.

Noel: There's almost too many.

Katie: okay so we've got that we can automate our tasks through our AI note taker we can automate tasks using our productivity app or task management app we've got like our schedule but how do we work out now using automations like what tasks actually are the most important like what a priority, like any, any that, like, you know, a deadline. Because maybe you put it in and you're like, let's go back to the VAT return example. So you've put that in like for a quarterly task. But, you know, three months down the line, you might not have remembered, you know, that you've put it in there. Yes.

Noel: So I guess one method we could do is to take your tasks within your, task management tool and then export them into AI so we can say well only grab ones that are going to be due within the next month for an example just so we give AI a bit of an overview of what's coming up and then so we we pass that information into AI we bake in those quarterly things like the VAT return they're always going to happen unfortunately they're always in there. So you could bake all that in there and then say, right, get the AI to summarize everything and then every Monday morning, say 8 o'clock, it sends you an email and says, hey, these are the things that I think you should be doing this week on these days based on, you know, when the due dates are and things that. And by also giving it a bit more, I mean, you could just give it the tasks that are due that week, but you kind of also, in your view of what's coming up as also, some of the tasks that are coming up might take, you know, four or five days for you to complete. So having that sort of view as well could also be helpful. So the area can say, well, look, maybe on Friday, you should probably look at that task that's due on next Friday because that's going to take you a bit of time to sort out. Yeah. That's kind of one way that I would definitely look to do it straight off.

Katie: Yeah, that's great.

Noel: I guess another way as well is if you have something like Slack, it could then send you those messages on Slack and then also send you reminders as well saying hey it's due tomorrow have you done it yet you know I mean it could get a bit annoying you know obviously you'll have to set some boundaries between you and your AI agents so it doesn't get on your nerves but you know those sort of things could be helpful

Katie: the the reminder is going to be absolutely brilliant

Noel: yes yeah especially something that you've completely forgotten about I guess it's like yeah Some of the really important, you're like, oh, my. Yes.

Katie: Yeah.

Noel: Don't get in trouble with the project manager.

Katie: No.

Noel: Yeah.

Katie: So you can do all of this null without an AI agent, which is great, especially like for people who might be setting this up as one of their first automations. But obviously, you can do this with an AI agent. So what would that actually look like?

Noel: So it could look different for anyone really, but I'll use Slack as an example. Most people have probably heard of Slack. And, you know, you can basically have like a chat channel and then have discussions with your AI agent about your tasks. So it would have access to your everything within your task management system. And then you can say, hey, what do I need to do today? What's due today? And then the agent would then go off, find that information. and send it back. And then once you've done it, you could say, well, this task, I've done that now. Can you, could you tick it off and it will go off and then do that action as well? So it will also, you know, tick stuff off. It can add stuff, you know, look for things. It can do all sorts of amazing things. But that for some people might work if you like to have more of a conversation with it instead of like having to look at the tool and then tick it off and log in and things out. So if you're on the, you know, you're walking about, you're on the move. You know, you could just open up Slack on your mobile, send it a voice note, and then it will go off and, yeah, and sort of that stuff out. So you could be walking to work and say, what have I got to do? And then you've got, you've got this task that's due in 30 minutes. You know, I better get a rig long.

Katie: Yeah, so it's a bit like when you're at home and you can ask Alexa to add things like to your shopping list. Yeah, basically, yeah.

Noel: I guess you could also get it to, depending on how much access you want to give it, you know, you could then create summaries and then send it off to your managers, say, well, here's all the stuff I've, can you send my manager everything that I've done today. And it will go off, create that email, send it to, obviously say you're amazing, as course, you know, you train the AI to do that first. Yeah,

Katie: yeah, yeah,

Noel: that's kind of how it would look.

Katie: But I, so just thinking, like, with my business brain, and that's also actually really helpful if you have like so if you're a business owner maybe you've got a virtual assistant and you you could say like send send me a i don't know like a a weekly email with what tasks you you have done or an update on say i don't know you're like building out a funnel or a new project or maybe it's a website and you're you're like building out a funnel or a website and you're like building out a funnel or maybe it's a website and you're you want updates and instead of like having you know like a zoom call they can just send you that email that literally takes them like a minute to kind of gather all the information and they can say send this client an update on all the tasks that I've done this week and then the tasks that I'm going to do next week

Noel: yeah that's really really powerful especially for a VA because they usually have multiple clients. anyway, don't they? So it's kind of... Yeah. Yeah.

Katie: And also quite good, like, if you're a project manager as well, because project managers, like, are always, like, chasing people and stuff, you know, and you could say to people, these are the tasks that needed to be done, like, how are we getting on? Like, you could automate all of that as well.

Noel: Yeah. Yeah, 100%. Yeah. You could, you can create any sort of reports. So, you know, you could, you could get it to output your reports in like Google Docs and get it to do all fancy HTML formatting and stuff to make it look nice and fancy and then send that to your boss and they go oh look at them you know they they put some effort into this

Katie: or did they just waste a lot of time doing this

Noel: no effort it's always effort

Katie: okay okay yeah okay so so we've kind of got like um basic options for people or just starting out with the automations and then we can bring the AI agent and then we can bring in as well like different automations for those who are project managers, virtual assistants and you know people who have got a report back to to managers and need to report back on tasks or or to a team.

Noel: Absolutely. All this gives you more time to actually do your tasks and not manage your tasks.

Katie: yeah which is great absolutely yeah amazing well we really hope that you have enjoyed this episode if you want any help with building out your tasks in a project management tool or a task management tool then we are actually teaching you this inside of our brand new membership which we will be launching very soon. And if you want to be on the VIP list, then all you need to do is send us a DM on LinkedIn. We have a free LinkedIn group, which is called AI Automations for businesses, or you can just email us at hello at makeautomations.aI, and we'll be sure to put you on that VIP list. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll catch you on another episode very soon.