Assign tasks
The highlighted information on this page refers to functionality not yet generally available. It is available only in the Preview Sandbox environment.
You can assign tasks to users, job roles, or teams to indicate who is responsible for completing the tasks. You can assign a task to more than one resource at a time.
- Reassign the work item to active resources.
- Associate the users in a deactivated team with an active team and reassign the work item to the active team.
The number of users assigned to a task and the schedule of the task Owner can modify the planned dates of a task which results in changing the timeline of the project. For information about the impact of assigning multiple users to a task, see Overview of modifying task assignments.
In addition to this article, we recommend that you read the following articles for more information about assigning tasks:
- Overview of modifying task assignments
- Smart assignments overview
- Make smart assignments
- Create advanced assignments
- Modify multiple user assignments in a task list
- Edit tasks
- Plan a project overview
- Overview of the task Planned Completion Date
- Set the project Planned Completion Date
- Configure system-wide project preferences
- Overview of assigning work in the Workload Balancer
Access requirements
You must have the following access to perform the steps in this article:
*To find out what plan, license type, or access you have, contact your Workfront administrator.
Considerations for multiple assignments to job roles, teams, and users
Consider the following when assigning multiple resources to a work item:
-
Users can have more than one job role associated with their profile. For information about associating users with job roles, see Edit a user’s profile.
-
If you assign more than one user to a task or issue, the first one user you select is designated automatically as the owner of the task or issue.
For instructions on changing this, see the information about the Make Primary option in the article Create advanced assignments. -
A team cannot be a Primary assignee on a task or issue. Only a user or a job role can be designated as a Primary on a task or issue.
-
Tasks and issues on a project might be assigned first to one or more teams or job roles. When the project is ready to start, they might need to also be assigned to users:
table 0-row-2 1-row-2 html-authored no-header Teams If you assign a task to a team and you also assign a user, the task remains assigned to the team and to the user, even if the user is not a member of the team. Job roles If you assign a task or an issue to one or multiple roles and then you also assign a user, decides which job role to associate with the additional user (if any) according to the following rules:
- If there is only one job role assigned and it matches the user's primary role (configured in their profile), the task or issue is assigned only to that user.
- If multiple roles are assigned and at least one of them matches one of the user's other roles, the task or issue is assigned to the user (the role is selected randomly if there are multiple matches), along with any additional roles that are assigned
- If at least one job role is assigned and there are no matches to the user's job roles, the task or issue is assigned to both the role or roles and to the user.
For information about a user's primary role and other roles, see Edit a user's profile.
Assign a single task
-
Go to a task that you want to assign.
-
Click Assign to in the Assignments field in the header of the task or issue.
Or
Click the name of the assignments if the task or issue is already assigned.
Sample image in the Production environment:
Sample image in the Preview environment:
-
Do one of the following:
-
Start typing the name of a user, role, or team that you want to assign, then click it when it appears on the list.
note tip TIP When adding a user assignment, notice the avatar, the user’s Primary Role, or their email address to distinguish between users with identical names. Users must be associated with at least one job role to view it as you add them. You must have the View Contact Info setting enabled in your access level for Users to view users’ emails. For information, see Grant access to users. When adding a job role assignment, you can search for the job role or location. Select the System/Default Job Role to use the default billing rate for the assignment, or select a Rate Card Job Role to use the billing rate from the rate card. For more information on rate cards, see Manage rate cards. -
(Conditional) Click one of the names in the Suggested assignments list, if this list displays. For more information, see Smart assignments overview.
-
Click Advanced
For information about how to make advanced assignments, see Create advanced assignments.
-
-
Click Save.
-
(Optional and conditional) Click the X icon next to the name of the assignment in the right panel of the task to remove an assignment, if you clicked Advanced.
Assign a task in a list
You can assign tasks in a list or a report when any of the assignments fields are visible in the list’s view. This is a faster way to assign tasks. This article describes how to modify assignments for one task in a list. For information about modifying multiple assignments for multiple tasks in a list, see Modify multiple user assignments in a task list.
Depending on which field is visible in the view, you can assign the following entities to the task:
To assign tasks in a list:
-
Go to a list of tasks that has the Assigned To, Assigned, or Assignments fields in the view.
-
(Optional) Click the Autosave drop-down menu and select from the following options:
table 0-row-2 1-row-2 2-row-2 3-row-2 Option Option description Autosave Changes you make to the tasks are automatically saved and you cannot revert them Manual save You must manually save your changes. You can revert your changes before you save them. Timeline Planning You must manually save your changes. You can revert your changes before you save them. Saving your changes and all the project dependencies is faster than when selecting Manual save. For more information about saving tasks as you edit them in a list, see Edit tasks in a list.
-
To assign tasks do one of the following:
-
Click inside the Assigned To or Assigned fields and start typing the name of an active user that you want to assign to the task, then click it when it displays in the list.
-
Click inside the Assignments field and start typing the name of an active user, job role, or team that you want to assign to the task, then click it when it displays in the list.
note tip TIP When adding a user assignment, notice the avatar, the user’s Primary Role, or their email address to distinguish between users with identical names. Users must be associated with at least one job role to view it as you add them. You must have the View Contact Info setting enabled in your access level for Users to view users’ emails. For information, see Grant access to users When adding a job role assignment, you can search for the job role or location. Select the System/Default Job Role to use the default billing rate for the assignment, or select a Rate Card Job Role to use the billing rate from the rate card. For more information on rate cards, see Manage rate cards.
-
-
(Conditional) When visible in the Assignments field, click the People icon in the upper-right corner of the assignments box to open the Advanced Assignments box and create advanced assignments.
For more information, see Create advanced assignments.
note tip TIP You cannot make advanced assignments from the Assigned To or Assigned fields. -
After adding your assignees to the task, press Enter or click anywhere on the page to save your changes if you selected Autosave. Otherwise, click Save.
Assign multiple tasks to a user
-
Go to a list of tasks that you want to assign in bulk.
-
(Conditional) Ensure that the Autosave option is selected if you are on a list of tasks under a project.
note important IMPORTANT You cannot edit tasks in bulk when saving tasks manually on a project. -
Select several tasks in the tasks list.
-
Click Edit.
The Edit Tasks dialog box opens.
-
In the Assignments area, select the Assignee box, then start typing the name of a user, job role, or team that you want to assign to all the tasks.
note important IMPORTANT If any of the tasks is already assigned, the resources you indicate here are added to the tasks instead of replacing the existing resources on the tasks. -
(Optional) Select the radio button in the Task Owner column to indicate which resource is the primary assignee or the Owner of the task, when you assign more than one resource to the task. This is not available for teams.
-
(Conditional) Specify the Allocation % for each resource assigned to the task if all the tasks you selected have a Duration Type of Effort Driven or Calculated Assignment. This indicates how much of their time these resources should spend on completing the task. This is only available for users and job roles.
Or
Specify the amount of Hours for each resource assigned to the task if all the tasks you selected have a Duration Type of Simple. The total of all hours for all resources should equal the number of Planned Hours for the task.
note important IMPORTANT You cannot specify the allocation percentage or the number of hours per resource if the tasks you selected have different Duration Types or of the tasks you selected have different Duration Types. For information about Duration Type on tasks, see Overview of Task Duration and Duration Type.
-
(Optional) Select a role that the user should fulfill on the task from the Pick a role drop-down menu in the Assignee’s Role column when you assign users to tasks. If you do not select a role, Workfront automatically selects the user’s Primary Role.
-
(Optional) If you want to remove existing assignees from all tasks do one of the following:
- Start typing the name of a user, role, or team you want to remove from the task, then select it when it appears on the list and click Remove Assignee to remove more assignees.
- Click Remove All Existing Assignees to remove all assignees from all selected tasks.
-
Click Save Changes.
-
(Optional and conditional) When the Assigned to or the Assignments fields display in your list of tasks, click inside one of these columns for a task, then click the X icon next to the name of an assignee to remove it from the task.