Creating Stringed Dependent Tasks in Notion

I. Introduction- Recap of previous video on "tasks databases" or "action item databases"- Overview of the series focusing on individual components of a comprehensive integrated notion life operating system- Introduction to the topic of dependent tasks

II. Understanding Dependent Tasks- Explanation of dependent tasks as a feature of Notion not found in many other specialized task management apps- Discussion of the concept of "due date" and "do date" in the task management system- Explanation of how dependent tasks do not have due dates because they follow in sequence after another task- Overview of the ability to have one dependent task or a whole string of them

III. Creating a Sequence of Dependent Tasks- Demonstration of how to create a chain of dependent tasks by linking one task to another- Description of the "following" and "next in line" fields and how they are used to create the chain- Explanation of how the first task in the chain does not have a "following" field

IV. Viewing the Dependent Tasks Database- Overview of how to access the dependent tasks database view- Explanation of how the view is filtered to only show items with a "following" field- Demonstration of how the chain of dependent tasks is displayed in the view- Example of how to follow the chain of dependent tasks by clicking on the "following" field of a task

V. Conclusion- Summary of the key points covered in the video- Encouragement to experiment with creating dependent tasks in the task management system.

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Hi everyone,

This video is a quick follow-up to the previous one, which was about tasks databases, or what I call the action item databases - the database of individual actions and tasks you need to do each day to move towards your bigger objectives. This whole series is diving into the individual components of a comprehensive integrated notion life operating system.

Last week, I did an overview of the whole system. Today, we're going to talk about dependent tasks, which is one of the great things about Notion. Very few dedicated, specialized task management apps have the ability to have dependent tasks - tasks that sequence behind other tasks.

In my system, as I showed yesterday, I have a due date and a "do" date - the date on which I intend to do each item in the action items database, or each task. The only exception is that dependent tasks don't have due dates because they follow in sequence after another task that does have a due date.

You can have one dependent task, or you can have a whole string of them. You can have a dependent task behind an assigned due date task, then a dependent task behind that dependent task, and then a dependent task behind each of those dependent tasks, creating a whole string of them. Alternately, you could have two dependent on one, but that usually doesn't make sense because you can really only do one thing at a time, so you might as well just have them all sequential - one, then one, then one - and then you have a string of them. As the first one gets done, it gets checked off and the dependent task moves up with a due date and becomes the head of the chain until you get to the end of the chain and you have them all done.

Let's dive into the system and see how it works. Okay, so when you look at the system here, we are in the database. This is not a dashboard, and this is not typically where I interact with it. I interact with this in my daily action zone dashboard, which is something we're going to look at in a few videos from now.

Just look at the database to see how it's set up. This is the action items database I showed you last time. The only difference is that this view is filtered in addition by due date, so these are just the tasks for today. And again, as I showed you last time, they're nicely sorted, organized, and very manageable.

I'm now going to switch over to the dependent tasks view, which is the view filtered to only show items that have the following field not empty, which means they're following something - there's something in the following field. So, what is the following field? These are items that are all following another task or another action item in this database, and by following, I mean they're dependent - they're dependent upon another action item or task. That is what makes this the dependent tasks database view.

So, what does that actually mean? Let's look at the first one we have an "Ask program course video slides" - basically make some slides. Now, if you look behind it, there's the "following" field. What this means is that this particular action item is following this other action item. And then, after this action item in this row in this view, we have the "next in line" field.

The "next in line" happens to be the next row - "Preps/setup vmix" is the next in line, which is the one behind it. Now, this one behind it is following a task, which is the one we just looked at above it, and though it has a "next in line" behind it, which is the next row here. Now, this next row - "Record first program segments" - is following a task, so it's dependent upon that other task, which is the row right above it.

Now, this one does not have a "next in line," so that's the end of the chain. That's how it works - you have a sequence of events. The one that the first in the chain is following is not in this view because that one's not following anything. If we click on the one that the first in the chain is following and open that one up, we'll see that it does have a due date.

That's it for dependent tasks. I hope that helps and gives you a better understanding of how they work in my system.

View here alone we see that one is assigned a do date, a due date, the data which it's going to be done, and a priority so that one's already scheduled in the system. So come March 24th, I'm either going to do that action or I'm going to reschedule it to another date if I do it at the same time I check this off.

So I'd open this one up, they open up the task, I'm going to check it as done and then I go to the next in line. The fact that there's a little plus in front of it means that this has a task behind it that there is a next in line. So it's just an extra reminder though most of my views are designed to show the next-in-line field so I can see if there's a dependent task on any given task so that when I check it off it's done, I go to the next in line open that up and I assign it a due date and now it assigns it a priority.

If it's coming up in the next day or two, the priority is going to mean a lot more. If the due date's a week or two away, it's just sort of a holding position to give me a sense when I get when my future self gets to this. I can see what my former self thought it was in terms of importance and it's just a little cue for my past self to my future self.

So I'm going to show you how to set this up but first I'm showing you how it works. So when we set it up you'll see what we're trying to achieve. If you look at the next one, this sequence ended here that means that was the end of the chain. You can see we have a longer chain here that ends with no next in line here and then a short chain at the bottom that ends with no next in line. So again this item here now this first one, the first one in every case is not in this view because this view is only items that are following something only items that are dependent this is following another item so this item is dependent but the one that's following is not dependent on anything so that one we if we open it up will see it has a due date and it has a priority set so when I come to that I'll either do it or I'll reschedule it down the road. If I do it

If I do a task at the same time as checking it off, I open the task and mark it as done. Then, I go to the next task in line. If there is a little plus sign in front of the task, it means that there is another task following it. This serves as a reminder that there is another task coming up. Most of my views are designed to show the next-in-line field so I can see if there are any dependent tasks on a given task. When I check off a task as done, I go to the next task in line and assign it a due date. I also assign it a priority if it is coming up in the next day or two. The priority is especially important if the due date is soon. If the due date is a week or two away, the priority is more of a holding position to give me a sense of the importance of the task when I get to it.

I am going to show you how to set up this system, but first I am going to show you how it works. If you look at the next task, you can see that the sequence ends here. This means that this was the end of the chain. You can see that we have a longer chain here that ends with no next in line, and then a short chain at the bottom that also ends with no next in line. The first task in every chain is not in this view because this view only shows items that are dependent on another task. If we open up the first task, we will see that it has a due date and a priority set.

The problem with having every task have a due date and not setting up these chains is that if the first task gets bumped and rescheduled, it is difficult to keep track of what is dependent on what. If all the tasks are independent floating objects without any connection to each other, it can be difficult to reschedule them all. This system allows you to know that there is a chain of tasks and you only have to change the due date of the first task in the chain. The rest of the tasks will automatically roll back with it. This is a great way to manage tasks and is not available in most to-do apps. Only more complex project management apps for larger organizations have this kind of functionality. I was excited to see that Notion can deliver this functionality, which is why I think it is the best task management app for individuals and small teams.

To set up this system, you need to go to your master tables and filter for today. If you have multiple tasks with the same priority rating, you can batch them together and assign them the same due date. When you create a new task, you can choose the task that it is dependent on from the drop-down menu. This creates a chain of tasks. You can also see what the previous and next tasks in the chain are by looking at the rows below and above the current task. The chain continues until it reaches the end.

In this text, the speaker is discussing how to set up dependent tasks in a task database using the software Notion. They explain that in order to set up a chain of dependent tasks, you need to add a new property or field to the database and select the "create a new property" option. This will create two fields, one called "following" and one called "next in line." The speaker then goes on to explain that you can set up a relational database that links to the same database you're in, but there is an additional trick to be aware of. They also note that the terms "epic" and "subtasks" are used in Notion to describe these fields, but they prefer the terms "following" and "next in line" because they find them more clear. The speaker then goes on to demonstrate how to rename the fields and how to select the task that you want to follow.

video number seven so we're following that one so I just clicked that and now this tasks notion video number eight is following notion video number seven right now here's the cool part close that an open notion video number seven scroll down to what we just created it's already entered the next in line for video seven that we just moved over to is video number eight so it automatically enters the reverse in the author field when we were in video number eight we entered following this field video number seven now that we've opened video number seven it automatically shows us followings empty because video number seven is not following anything but next in line has automatically entered video number eight so the reverse has already been entered.

Great so now video number eight here now we have the we've setup the dependency so we can remove the due date for video number eight hit clear now it's not showing this view anymore now we just have seven and nine now nine should follow eight so we opened number nine scroll down and we choose following you can either scroll through looking for it or just start typing the name of it notion we want to follow video number eight since this is video number nine and there's video number eight hit the plus sign so now we're in video number nine we just said it's following video number eight now you can click through here straight into video number eight scroll down to the same fields now video number eight just added that video number nine is next in line and previously we added that it's following video number seven so this is the one in the middle video number eight we have first added that it's following video number seven and then just added then line is video number nine the sequence is complete so now video number nine we can remove the due date by hitting clear in the date field now if we go back to the dependent task view now remember I previously had this set up with two other fields so this is viewing on the two original fields not the two we just added so we're going to change the filter - it's a little confusing because we use the same name so there's the original following in the original next in line now the original one I had is following with three dots so we can tell the difference the new one we created is just following with no dots so we're gonna change the filter from following with three dots to just following which is the one we just created change it to is not empty so following is not empty will give us the view of all the dependent tasks just to be clear I've changed the filter from my original following filter which had my existing system that I use - the new one we just added for the sake of this particular demonstration so I also just switch these two columns the following in the next in line to the new fields and properties I just added for the sake of this demo so now we see the previous view but applied only to the new following and next in line fields so the two we just created notion video number nine in the ocean video number eight now it lists them backwards I don't like that because I want to be able to look at this and see the next in line should be the next row and the next in line to be the next row so it's organized so all you got to do here is just manually sort them whenever you create them just make sure you sort them in the view that you're going to look at your dependent tasks in they're not always sorted properly sometimes they are sometimes or not all you just do is drag the six dots and put it in the sequence like that and then they're there so we've got video number eight which is following video number seven video sevens not listed because it's not following anything it has an assigned

Due date, but video number eight is following that. Then, next in line is video number nine, which is the next row. Video number nine has number eight listed under the following column. There's nothing next in line, so that's the end of the chain. And that is how you do it. So there you go - that is how I create dependent tasks in my Ocean Action Items database.

It is a huge feature that you don't find in any to-do apps that I've ever seen, and it's very clean and very obvious. You can organize in the dashboard that we'll talk about in a day or two how this is all viewed and how you can immediately see what's linked to what, what follows what, what the sequence is. And then, if you have to reschedule something, you just reschedule the first in the chain. Everything else just stays in line.

This notion action item database isn't particularly fancy in how it works. It's not like a showpiece. It's elegant in how it interacts with the system, and you'll really see that as we start looking at the whole dashboard for my action zone and daily activities. And how we start rolling up the pyramid, up the pillars, the pipeline's pyramid to see how everything interconnects and how you get of you and an understanding and an internal comprehension of everything up the chain - both the minute-by-minute, hour-by-hour, day-by-day tasks and the week-by-week, month-by-month projects in the quarter-by-quarter, year-by-year pillars and values and priorities in your life. And that's what makes this so powerful.

So, I can't wait to get further along in this evolution of unfolding how this life operating system works. The next video after this one is going to be on daily tracking, which is the other component of daily activity. So, how to track what matters most to you, how to define the metrics that are going to get you from where you are now to where you want to go. That's next, and then we'll look at the action zone dashboard where you put the daily tracking and the action items database all together in terms of how you execute your minutes and your hours in your days, and we'll build from there. And then, we'll work up the pipeline.

If this is of interest, be sure to hit the subscribe button and the bell icon to get updates on future videos. Leave your thoughts or questions below and hit like if you found this valuable. I also write a newsletter called "Mind and Machine" on increasing human capability. I give away several of my best notion templates to anyone who subscribes to the newsletter. You can, of course, unsubscribe at any time, but I hope you'll give it a chance. I work very hard to pack it with a lot of valuable insight. The newsletter link is also below in the show notes. Thanks for watching. Lots more to come.

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