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How can I effectively assign tasks to people?
Why is it that despite assigning tasks, some groups reach peak productivity and project success, while others grapple with conflicts and burnout?
And how can I address and solve issues related to task assignment?
In this article, we’ll provide answers to all of these questions.
Ready to elevate your task assignment skills and boost your project success? Let’s dive right in!
1. What is task assigning?
Task assigning is the process of allocating specific duties to team members to achieve a common goal.
2. Why is assigning tasks to team members important?
Effective task assigning is crucial for achieving team goals and maintaining productivity because it improves:
There’s more.
As everyone knows their role, responsibilities, and how their work contributes to the bigger picture, they feel less confused and more accountable for their assigned task.
Below are the best strategies, practices, and tips for assigning tasks to others effectively.
Ensure you get a clear understanding of:
This step allows you to match the right tasks with the right team member, which helps allocate tasks efficiently, increase productivity, and maximize project success.
Follow these steps:
This makes it easier for managers to allocate responsibilities and track progress while helping team members better grasp the overall process.
Prioritize tasks based on 3 factors: 1) urgency, 2) importance, and 3) complexity. Here’s how:
This valuable step helps managers make informed decisions on which tasks to tackle first and find the right people to work on each task.
Assign tasks to the most qualified people.
Start by allocating high-priority tasks to the first available person with the matching expertise. Schedule low-priority tasks.
Straightforward tasks can be assigned to less experienced members, while complex tasks may be given to those with advanced skills.
If you know your employees well enough, then make a list of dependable people who are ready to take on a little more duties.
Give them low-priority yet important tasks with authority.
To avoid disputes, constant clarification, or errors, it’s important to help your team members understand:
Tips: Use clear and concise language when communicating. Encourage employees to ask questions and seek clarification on the project and their assigned tasks.
Check-in with team members regularly to see how they are doing and if they need any help.
Encourage them to open up and transparently communicate their concerns and challenges.
On your side as a team leader or project manager, be available to offer assistance if they encounter challenges.
This helps resolve issues and improve the task assignment process.
Ensure that team members have the necessary resources, tools, and information for their task completion.
After each project or task, take time to reflect on what worked well, what didn’t, and where certain tasks weren’t up to par.
Address any issues and offer feedback on completed tasks. Use this feedback to refine your approach in future assignments.
Recognize and reward everyone’s efforts and contributions. This helps keep employees excited and motivated.
Invest in training and development opportunities for your team to enhance new skills and knowledge.
Extra tips for assigning tasks effectively:
In this section, I’ll show you how a project management tool like Upbase helps simplify task assignments, improve morale, and increase outcomes.
Quick info:
Sign up for a free Upbase account here , follow this guide, and take your task assignment process to the next level.
Create a new list:
Add new tasks to the list:
Add new tasks via emails : Open the dropdown menu next to the list name, select “add tasks via emails”, and follow the instructions.
Add task details:
You can add specific instructions, priorities, deadlines, and other attributes to individual tasks and subtasks.
Keyboard shortcuts : Hover over a task card and press:
Upbase Tip : Use task tags to categorize tasks by urgency, importance, and complexity. This makes it easier to match the right tasks to people for later.
Check your employee availability:
Go to the Members page, and click on the team member you’d to assess their workload.
You’ll be driven to a separate page that shows that member’s assigned tasks, along with their due dates, priorities, etc. You can also filter tasks by one of these attributes.
Use this page to check each employee’s availability and identify who can complete additional tasks.
Assign tasks:
Open the desired task, click “Assignee”, and choose the right team member(s).
Keyboard shortcuts : Hover over the task and press “A” to open the Assignee picker. Press the space bar to assign yourself. This way makes assigning tasks easier and quicker!
If you want multiple people to work on a particular task, consider dividing it into subtasks, give time estimates for each, and then assign them to the right team member(s).
Communicate tasks:
Use the Messages and Chat modules to communicate with your team.
Messages is best suited to show the big picture, like project goals, desired outcomes, everyone’s duties, and how their work contributes to the whole.
Make use of the comment box to encourage everyone to ask questions and seek clarification about the project or their assigned tasks.
Chat supports both 1:1 chats and group chats. It’s perfect for quick discussions about issues, task deadlines, etc.
Upbase offers an array of tools for project managers to track the workload of other employees.
To track a project’s progress:
From the Tasks module :
Here, you can view tasks in a List or Board format.
The List format provides an overview of tasks, deadlines, priorities, and employees working on them, while the Board visualizes the project’s progress.
Besides, you can group tasks by due date, priority, assignee, or section. View tasks filtered by one or multiple tags. Or create a custom filter.
From the Calendar module:
It shows all the scheduled tasks within a project by week or month. It also allows you to create a new task or reschedule overdue tasks.
To track the progress of all projects in a workspace :
Filters : In addition to filtering tasks within a project, you can create custom filters across multiple or all projects in a workspace.
Schedule : It functions similarly to the Calendar module. The two main differences are:
1) Schedule is to track the progress of tasks from all projects while Calendar is to track the progress of tasks within a project.
2) Schedule offers an additional view, named Daily Planner.
Other tools for progress tracking:
My Tasks : A private place where you can get an overview of all the tasks you create or tasks assigned to you.
Use Upbase’s Docs, Files, and Links to provide employees with resources, information, and tools they need to complete tasks.
These modules are available in each list, making it easy to manage project data separately. Plus, they all provide collaboration features like watchers and comment boxes.
On the Tasks module, you can create a section, named “Review”.
When a task is completed, the assignee will drag and drop it here. Then, you, as a project manager will leave feedback on it via the comment box.
So, why wait? Sign up for a free Upbase account now and experience it yourself.
For successful task assignment, remember to avoid these common mistakes:
Some people, particularly new or inexperienced managers, may hesitate to allocate tasks to others due to concerns about:
This fear can hinder productivity and personal growth within a team or organization.
This means that the instructions and details regarding a task are not transparent.
Team members may not have a clear understanding of what they are supposed to do, what the goals are, or what the expected outcomes should be.
This lack of clarity can lead to confusion and misunderstandings.
Poor communication can contribute to misunderstandings and problems in task assignments, too.
However, it addresses different aspects of the overall process.
Poor communication means that there might be a lack of information sharing or ineffective communication methods. This could include:
Even with clear instructions, if there’s poor communication, the information may not be conveyed effectively.
Assigning too many tasks to a single person or team can overwhelm them and negatively impact the quality of their work. It’s crucial to distribute tasks evenly and consider each individual’s capacity.
Neglecting to match tasks with team members’ skills and strengths can result in subpar performance. Assign tasks based on individuals’ expertise and abilities to optimize results.
Hovering over team members and scrutinizing every detail of their work can stifle creativity and motivation.
Trust your team to complete their tasks and provide support when needed.
Being rigid in task assignments can prevent adaptation to changing circumstances or new information. It’s essential to remain open to adjustments and feedback.
Setting unattainable deadlines can put unnecessary pressure on your team and lead to a rushed and subpar outcome. Ensure that timelines are realistic and allow for unexpected delays.
Forgetting to provide constructive feedback or failing to seek input from team members can hinder growth and improvement. Regularly discuss progress and provide guidance when necessary.
In summary:
Successful task assignment relies on clear communication, matching tasks to skills, flexibility, and a supportive, accountable, and feedback-driven environment.
Avoiding these common mistakes will help ensure that tasks are completed efficiently and effectively.
Task delegation means you give someone the authority to make decisions and complete tasks independently without constant supervision.
Task allocation, on the other hand, means you assign specific duties to someone, often with clear instructions, while retaining overall control.
A delegated task gives the team member more freedom to make decisions and determine how to produce the desired results. An assigned task is more limited because it’s based on instructions and under supervision.
In short, delegating tasks typically involves a higher degree of trust and empowerment than allocating tasks.
Tasks are generally larger, more significant activities that need to be completed, while subtasks are smaller, specific components or steps that contribute to the completion of a task.
Subtasks are often part of a broader task and help break it down into manageable pieces.
The person assigned to a task is called an “assignee”. They’re responsible for completing that specific job or duty.
Delegate a task to the person best suited for it based on their skills, expertise, and availability.
Choose someone who can complete the task effectively and efficiently, taking into account their experience and workload.
The best way to assign tasks to others is by considering each member’s strengths, skills, and workload capacity, and aligning tasks with their expertise and availability.
Assigning tasks to team members is crucial because it ensures clarity, accountability, and efficiency in achieving goals.
It helps prevent duplication of efforts, enables better time management, and allows team members to focus on their strengths, ultimately leading to successful project completion.
To politely assign a task, you can follow these steps:
Short-term goals are specific, achievable objectives that you aim to accomplish soon, typically within days, weeks, or months.
Long-term goals are broader, more substantial objectives that you work towards over an extended period, often spanning years.
Short-term goals are like stepping stones to reach long-term goals.
Tasks, messages, docs, files, chats – all in one place.
What this handout is about.
The first step in any successful college writing venture is reading the assignment. While this sounds like a simple task, it can be a tough one. This handout will help you unravel your assignment and begin to craft an effective response. Much of the following advice will involve translating typical assignment terms and practices into meaningful clues to the type of writing your instructor expects. See our short video for more tips.
Regardless of the assignment, department, or instructor, adopting these two habits will serve you well :
Many assignments follow a basic format. Assignments often begin with an overview of the topic, include a central verb or verbs that describe the task, and offer some additional suggestions, questions, or prompts to get you started.
The instructor might set the stage with some general discussion of the subject of the assignment, introduce the topic, or remind you of something pertinent that you have discussed in class. For example:
“Throughout history, gerbils have played a key role in politics,” or “In the last few weeks of class, we have focused on the evening wear of the housefly …”
Pay attention; this part tells you what to do when you write the paper. Look for the key verb or verbs in the sentence. Words like analyze, summarize, or compare direct you to think about your topic in a certain way. Also pay attention to words such as how, what, when, where, and why; these words guide your attention toward specific information. (See the section in this handout titled “Key Terms” for more information.)
“Analyze the effect that gerbils had on the Russian Revolution”, or “Suggest an interpretation of housefly undergarments that differs from Darwin’s.”
Here you will find some questions to use as springboards as you begin to think about the topic. Instructors usually include these questions as suggestions rather than requirements. Do not feel compelled to answer every question unless the instructor asks you to do so. Pay attention to the order of the questions. Sometimes they suggest the thinking process your instructor imagines you will need to follow to begin thinking about the topic.
“You may wish to consider the differing views held by Communist gerbils vs. Monarchist gerbils, or Can there be such a thing as ‘the housefly garment industry’ or is it just a home-based craft?”
These are the instructor’s comments about writing expectations:
“Be concise”, “Write effectively”, or “Argue furiously.”
These instructions usually indicate format rules or guidelines.
“Your paper must be typed in Palatino font on gray paper and must not exceed 600 pages. It is due on the anniversary of Mao Tse-tung’s death.”
The assignment’s parts may not appear in exactly this order, and each part may be very long or really short. Nonetheless, being aware of this standard pattern can help you understand what your instructor wants you to do.
Ask yourself a few basic questions as you read and jot down the answers on the assignment sheet:
Who is your audience.
Try to look at the question from the point of view of the instructor. Recognize that your instructor has a reason for giving you this assignment and for giving it to you at a particular point in the semester. In every assignment, the instructor has a challenge for you. This challenge could be anything from demonstrating an ability to think clearly to demonstrating an ability to use the library. See the assignment not as a vague suggestion of what to do but as an opportunity to show that you can handle the course material as directed. Paper assignments give you more than a topic to discuss—they ask you to do something with the topic. Keep reminding yourself of that. Be careful to avoid the other extreme as well: do not read more into the assignment than what is there.
Of course, your instructor has given you an assignment so that they will be able to assess your understanding of the course material and give you an appropriate grade. But there is more to it than that. Your instructor has tried to design a learning experience of some kind. Your instructor wants you to think about something in a particular way for a particular reason. If you read the course description at the beginning of your syllabus, review the assigned readings, and consider the assignment itself, you may begin to see the plan, purpose, or approach to the subject matter that your instructor has created for you. If you still aren’t sure of the assignment’s goals, try asking the instructor. For help with this, see our handout on getting feedback .
Given your instructor’s efforts, it helps to answer the question: What is my purpose in completing this assignment? Is it to gather research from a variety of outside sources and present a coherent picture? Is it to take material I have been learning in class and apply it to a new situation? Is it to prove a point one way or another? Key words from the assignment can help you figure this out. Look for key terms in the form of active verbs that tell you what to do.
Key Terms: Finding Those Active Verbs
Here are some common key words and definitions to help you think about assignment terms:
Information words Ask you to demonstrate what you know about the subject, such as who, what, when, where, how, and why.
Relation words Ask you to demonstrate how things are connected.
Interpretation words Ask you to defend ideas of your own about the subject. Do not see these words as requesting opinion alone (unless the assignment specifically says so), but as requiring opinion that is supported by concrete evidence. Remember examples, principles, definitions, or concepts from class or research and use them in your interpretation.
More Clues to Your Purpose As you read the assignment, think about what the teacher does in class:
Now, what about your reader? Most undergraduates think of their audience as the instructor. True, your instructor is a good person to keep in mind as you write. But for the purposes of a good paper, think of your audience as someone like your roommate: smart enough to understand a clear, logical argument, but not someone who already knows exactly what is going on in your particular paper. Remember, even if the instructor knows everything there is to know about your paper topic, they still have to read your paper and assess your understanding. In other words, teach the material to your reader.
Aiming a paper at your audience happens in two ways: you make decisions about the tone and the level of information you want to convey.
You’ll find a much more detailed discussion of these concepts in our handout on audience .
With a few exceptions (including some lab and ethnography reports), you are probably being asked to make an argument. You must convince your audience. It is easy to forget this aim when you are researching and writing; as you become involved in your subject matter, you may become enmeshed in the details and focus on learning or simply telling the information you have found. You need to do more than just repeat what you have read. Your writing should have a point, and you should be able to say it in a sentence. Sometimes instructors call this sentence a “thesis” or a “claim.”
So, if your instructor tells you to write about some aspect of oral hygiene, you do not want to just list: “First, you brush your teeth with a soft brush and some peanut butter. Then, you floss with unwaxed, bologna-flavored string. Finally, gargle with bourbon.” Instead, you could say, “Of all the oral cleaning methods, sandblasting removes the most plaque. Therefore it should be recommended by the American Dental Association.” Or, “From an aesthetic perspective, moldy teeth can be quite charming. However, their joys are short-lived.”
Convincing the reader of your argument is the goal of academic writing. It doesn’t have to say “argument” anywhere in the assignment for you to need one. Look at the assignment and think about what kind of argument you could make about it instead of just seeing it as a checklist of information you have to present. For help with understanding the role of argument in academic writing, see our handout on argument .
There are many kinds of evidence, and what type of evidence will work for your assignment can depend on several factors–the discipline, the parameters of the assignment, and your instructor’s preference. Should you use statistics? Historical examples? Do you need to conduct your own experiment? Can you rely on personal experience? See our handout on evidence for suggestions on how to use evidence appropriately.
Make sure you are clear about this part of the assignment, because your use of evidence will be crucial in writing a successful paper. You are not just learning how to argue; you are learning how to argue with specific types of materials and ideas. Ask your instructor what counts as acceptable evidence. You can also ask a librarian for help. No matter what kind of evidence you use, be sure to cite it correctly—see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial .
You cannot always tell from the assignment just what sort of writing style your instructor expects. The instructor may be really laid back in class but still expect you to sound formal in writing. Or the instructor may be fairly formal in class and ask you to write a reflection paper where you need to use “I” and speak from your own experience.
Try to avoid false associations of a particular field with a style (“art historians like wacky creativity,” or “political scientists are boring and just give facts”) and look instead to the types of readings you have been given in class. No one expects you to write like Plato—just use the readings as a guide for what is standard or preferable to your instructor. When in doubt, ask your instructor about the level of formality they expect.
No matter what field you are writing for or what facts you are including, if you do not write so that your reader can understand your main idea, you have wasted your time. So make clarity your main goal. For specific help with style, see our handout on style .
The technical information you are given in an assignment always seems like the easy part. This section can actually give you lots of little hints about approaching the task. Find out if elements such as page length and citation format (see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial ) are negotiable. Some professors do not have strong preferences as long as you are consistent and fully answer the assignment. Some professors are very specific and will deduct big points for deviations.
Usually, the page length tells you something important: The instructor thinks the size of the paper is appropriate to the assignment’s parameters. In plain English, your instructor is telling you how many pages it should take for you to answer the question as fully as you are expected to. So if an assignment is two pages long, you cannot pad your paper with examples or reword your main idea several times. Hit your one point early, defend it with the clearest example, and finish quickly. If an assignment is ten pages long, you can be more complex in your main points and examples—and if you can only produce five pages for that assignment, you need to see someone for help—as soon as possible.
Your instructors are not fooled when you:
Critical reading of assignments leads to skills in other types of reading and writing. If you get good at figuring out what the real goals of assignments are, you are going to be better at understanding the goals of all of your classes and fields of study.
You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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Definition of assignment noun from the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary
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| Grammarist
An assignment is a task given to a specific person or group to complete. It can also mean the act of assigning . In some legal fields it can refer to the transferring of ownership of property.
An assignation is the act of assigning or the actual assignment. But it also means a secret rendezvous for lovers, most especially for affairs or illicit relationships. Sometimes this is used to mean a secret meeting or a regularly set meeting, but it would be confusing in this sense to those who are familiar with the standard meaning (see the example below). As a mass noun it can refer to something as being owned or belonging to something else.
Examples The choice has not been made, but it appears the team is more likely to option Orlando to Omaha, rather than designate Dyson for assignment. [ The Kansas City Star ] According to a criminal complaint, Ms Dale, 21, told a detective that Ethan refused to complete the assignment for the first time on 24 February. [ International Business Times ] I vaguely remember seeing images of Delhiites being water-hosed by police while rioting for “Nirbhaya,” an assignation that means “Fearless One,” given to Pandey by the media as authorities would not release her name. [ Huffington Post ] The rare exceptions include a scene in which Shulem follows his wife to an assignation with Félix, slapping his romantic rival to the sidewalk like a petulant schoolboy. [ The Washington Post ] Over the past few months, RPG Enterprises chairman Harsh Goenka, has been having an assignation every other Friday for a few hours. [ India Times ]
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With task publishing in Microsoft Teams, operations managers and other business leaders can centrally define tasks and distribute them to the teams across your organization who must perform the work. You create a list on the Publishing page of the Planner app, add tasks to it, and then publish the list to the teams (locations) that you choose. Completion requirements can be added to tasks as part of task publishing. Completion requirements allow you to enforce certain actions as prerequisites for task completion, so a task can’t be marked complete unless those actions are completed first. This increases clarity and first-time completion success for frontline managers and workers. It also helps prevent tasks from being incorrectly marked complete before all the necessary steps are completed. Three types of completion requirements are available in task publishing: checklist requirement, form requirement, and approval requirement.
You can apply one or more completion requirements to a task whenever you add or edit tasks in a publishable task list. When that task is published, task recipients must complete all completion requirements on the task before they can mark it complete. Task recipients can complete the completion requirements using the Planner app in Teams on desktop, web, or mobile. This capability helps provide peace of mind to both the employee and business leaders that the right steps were completed before the task was marked complete
Set a checklist requirement, add a form requirement, add an approval requirement, other planner clients.
When you set a checklist requirement, task recipients must complete all items on the checklist before they can mark the task complete.
In the task list, select the task title to open the task.
Under Che cklist , add your items. You can add up to 20 items.
Note: The Required toggle is hidden if the task doesn’t have any checklist items.
When a user on the recipient team—typically a frontline worker or manager—opens the task, they’ll see the checklist items, with an indication that the checklist items are required. They can't mark the task complete until all checklist items are marked complete. When all requirements are met, any frontline employee can mark the task complete.
You can add up to two forms to a task for task recipients to fill out before they can mark a task complete. You can create a new form or use any form previously created through task publishing. This feature is powered by Microsoft Forms and allows you to collect information from your teams without having to individually contact each location.
Under Requirements , choose Required form .
Under Select a group , choose a group. Members of this group will be able to view the form responses. Be sure to choose a group that includes the people you want to share the form responses with.
If you're creating a new form
Under Text to display on task , enter a name for the form, and then select Create and add to task .
Include a question that identifies the location of the team, such as retail store number, so you can match the response with the location.
Make sure the form settings allow respondents to edit their responses.
If you're using an existing form
Under Choose an existing form to add , search for and select the form you want to add.
Under Text to display on task , enter a name for the form, and then select Add to task .
After you publish the task list, you’ll want to view the form responses from task recipients.
Open the form, and go to the Responses tab. From here, you can:
See summary information about your form and responses.
Select View results to see response details of each respondent.
Select More Details under each question to see the name of each respondent and their response.
Select Open in Excel to view responses in an Excel workbook. The workbook provides a snapshot of the current response data.
Tip: When viewing responses in Excel, sort by date completed or modified (or by the identifier and then date completed or modified) to review the most recent responses from each location. In some cases, a location might submit more than one response.
To learn more, see Check and share your form results .
If your form includes one or more file upload questions , you can view the uploaded images one by one from the Responses tab, as described earlier. If you want, you can also access the folder where the files are uploaded. Uploaded files are stored under the SharePoint files of the publishing team.
The SharePoint folders are created when the first file is uploaded as part of a form response submission. When the first file upload submission is received, the document library for the team will contain an Apps folder. Within that, a Microsoft Forms folder contains a folder with the name of your form. Within this folder is a folder for each question in the form that has uploaded files. For example, if you added a form named “Store opening survey” that includes three file upload questions, the uploaded files are in the following folders for the group in SharePoint:
Documents\Apps\Microsoft Forms\Store opening survey\Question
Documents\Apps\Microsoft Forms\Store opening survey\Question 1
Documents\Apps\Microsoft Forms\Store opening survey\Question 2
There may be cases where one member of the team completed the survey and a manager or another colleague on that team wants to review what was submitted by their teammate.
For this reason, we provide an experience for someone on the team to see the form responses that were submitted for their location. This works without any additional setup for questions that don’t require a file upload. For questions that require a file upload, the submitted files are uploaded to a folder in the publishing team, which members of the recipient teams don’t typically have access to. If a user views the form responses submitted by their team and they don’t have access to the uploaded file, they’ll see a link to the file, which takes them to a SharePoint site that allows them to ask for permissions.
You can also share the folder of uploaded files with all users in your organization. If you're comfortable sharing the folder with everyone in your organization, you can proactively complete this step and users will also see any images uploaded by their team members as part of the form response submission.
To share the SharePoint folder that contains the uploaded files:
Go to the Documents\Apps\Microsoft Forms folder in the publishing team files.
Tip: Remember that this folder won't appear until a form with a file upload question has a response submitted.
Locate and select the Share button for the folder. If you want, select the pencil icon to change the permissions from Can edit to Can view .
Select that group, and then select Send .
After you complete these steps, the folder and all its subfolders are shared with that group, which should include the members of the recipient teams. Because all subsequent forms will also upload files under the Microsoft Forms folder, completing this step one time should work for all past and future forms used as completion requirements by that publishing team. To learn more about how to share a SharePoint folder, see Share SharePoint files or folders.
When a user on the recipient team—typically a frontline worker or manager—opens the task, they’ll see that submission of the form is required. They can open the form and complete the questions without leaving the task. Keep in mind that taking a photo to upload as part of form submission requires device permissions to access the camera. After the form is submitted, the task reflects that the form requirement is met. Any member of that team who views the task can also view the responses submitted by their team. When all requirements are met, any frontline employee can mark the task complete.
When you add an approval requirement to a task, task recipients must request and receive approval from a manager before they can mark it complete.
Note: You can only add an approval requirement to tasks in standard task lists . Approval requirements aren't allowed on tasks in lists that everyone must complete . Learn more about task lists in task publishing .
This feature is powered by the Approvals app and enables frontline managers to verify that work is done to standard, which helps to increase attention to detail and accountability, especially for important tasks.
In the task list, select the task title to open the task, and then under Requirements , choose Required approval .
When a user on the recipient team—typically a frontline worker or manager—opens the task, they’ll see that they must request and receive approval for the work on the task before they can mark it complete.
That frontline employee can choose a member of the team to request approval from. Typically, this is their manager. However, the employee can choose a different member of the team, which may be helpful if their manager is on vacation. The task reflects which user made the request and who they requested approval from, so the team has visibility into their request. The designated approver receives a notification from the Approvals app, and they can grant approval when viewing the task itself or from the Approvals app.
A frontline employee who views the task can see the current state of the approval request. They can't mark the task complete until the approval request reflects that it was approved. If needed, a frontline employee can cancel a request and make a new request. When the approval request associated with the task shows as Approved, that requirement is met. When all requirements are met, any frontline employee can mark the task complete.
Tasks with completion requirements are designed to be used in the Planner app within Teams. They're not currently supported in other Planner experiences, such as the Planner app for iOS or Android. If a user is using an app outside of Teams to interact with the task, the completion requirement is still enforced. However, if someone tries to complete a task that has an unmet completion requirement, they won't be able to mark the task complete. Instead, they receive an error message. If all completion requirements are met, a user can successfully mark the task complete from a different Planner client outside of Teams.
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Bibliometrics & citations, view options, recommendations, bilateral privacy-preserving task assignment with personalized participant selection for mobile crowdsensing.
Mobile crowdsensing (MCS) as an emerging data collection paradigm allows people to collect data for more effective decision-making. Task assignment as an integral part of MCS plays an important role in the working of the system. However, the ...
Nowadays, with the improvement of internet technology and advancement in distributed computing data is increasing rapidly. There is a need of information sharing between organizations. Ideally, we wish to share data from multiple private databases and ...
In this paper, we study the privacy-preserving task assignment problem in spatial crowdsourcing, where the locations of both workers and tasks, prior to their release to the server, are perturbed with Geo-Indistinguishability (a differential privacy ...
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Deep reinforcement learning-based task assignment for cooperative mobile edge computing.
Documentation Topics
Published: April 25, 2023 Citation: IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing vol. 23, no. 4, (April 2024) pp. 3156-3171
Li-Tse Hsieh (Catholic University of America) , Hang Liu (Catholic University of America) , Yang Guo (NIST) , Robert Gazda (InterDigital, Inc.)
Mobile edge computing (MEC) integrates computing resources in wireless access networks to process computational tasks in close proximity to mobile users with low latency. This paper investigates the task assignment problem for cooperative MEC networks in which a set of geographically distributed heterogeneous edge servers not only cooperate with remote cloud data centers but also help each other to jointly process user tasks. We introduce a novel stochastic MEC cooperation framework to model the edge-to-edge horizontal cooperation and the edge-to-cloud vertical cooperation. The task assignment optimization problem is formulated by taking into consideration dynamic network states, uncertain node computing capabilities and task arrivals, as well as the heterogeneity of the involved entities. We then develop and compare three task assignment algorithms, based on different deep reinforcement learning (DRL) approaches, value-based, policy-based, and hybrid approaches. In addition, to reduce the search space and computation complexity of the algorithms, we propose decomposition and function approximation techniques by leveraging the structure of the underlying problem. The evaluation results show that the proposed DRL-based task assignment schemes outperform the existing algorithms, and the hybrid actor-critic scheme performs the best under dynamic MEC network environments.
None selected
Publication: https://doi.org/10.1109/TMC.2023.3270242 Preprint (pdf)
Supplemental Material: None available
Document History: 04/25/23: Journal Article (Final)
cloud & virtualization , mobile
communications & wireless
Since launching over a year ago, ChatGPT has become seemingly omnipresent.
At work, people have used the OpenAI product to develop code , generate marketing materials , and create lesson plans . It's become so popular that companies are now hiring workers who have ChatGPT expertise to boost their bottom lines.
And in their everyday lives, people are turning to the chatbot for help with losing weight , landing dates , and delaying aging.
But ChatGPT doesn't always produce desirable outcomes, and the tech can be prone to errors and misinformation.
It all comes down to the prompts users put into ChatGPT.
"If you really want to generate something that is going to be useful for you, you need to do more than just write a generic sentence," Jacqueline DeStefano-Tangorra, a consultant who uses ChatGPT to secure new contracts, told Insider .
Insider sifted through AI research and asked AI enthusiasts, ChatGPT coaches, and workers who use the chatbot for tips on how to get ChatGPT to do what you want.
1. assign chatgpt a specific role.
ChatGPT works best when you assign it a persona — such as a specific job role — Jason Gulya, an AI council chair at Berkeley College who teaches clients how to use ChatGPT, said.
Rob Cressy, the founder of the AI-coaching firm GPT Leaders, told Insider to "talk to ChatGPT like an employee" to help accomplish particular goals or tasks.
To do this, Gulya suggests that users write a prompt that includes a specific, concrete description of the persona you want the chatbot to take on. Begin your prompt with "act as a professor" or "act as a marketing professional," followed by a description of the desired outcome.
Once you give ChatGPT a role, craft the prompt so it can accomplish a singular task such as writing a 300-word cover letter or generating a recipe for a protein-packed dinner.
"Don't ask it to do too much at once," Cressy said.
If you're a marketing professional, and you want ChatGPT to build a list of emails, Peggy Dean, an artist who runs a ChatGPT course for creatives , recommends crafting what she calls a "power prompt," a concise and detailed prompt.
If asking ChatGPT to brief a marketing campaign, she said she'd include target audiences, key features, and calls to action.
If asking the chatbot to come up with an email list and calls to action, she said she'd say:
"Pretend you are an expert email marketer and your client is a [role] specializing in [offerings] for [target audience]. Your goal is to build a robust email list in order to accomplish [goal]. Your client uses [platform(s)] to reach their audience. Come up with [details or quantity] ideal call to action ideas of [freebies or lead magnets] your client can provide."
"It's crucial to have a clear idea of what you hope to achieve," Dean told Insider.
If ChatGPT's response isn't quite what you're looking for, Cressy said to build on its output by fine-tuning the initial prompt. He calls this process "peeling back an onion."
"Don't be afraid to refine your prompts," DeStefano-Tangorra said. "If the initial output doesn't match your expectation, rephrase the prompt, add more detail, or clarify the context."
If the answer to a prompt asking ChatGPT to "suggest a good book" is too vague, refine it to something like: "As someone who loves mystery novels with strong female leads, like Agatha Christie's Miss Marple series, can you suggest other similar books that I may enjoy?"
ChatGPT prompts should include context such as historical information, user profiles, preferences, or any relevant details to guide its response, DeStefano-Tangorra said. The more specific, the better.
Asking ChatGPT to "suggest dinner recipes," will lead to a generic output. Instead, DeStefano-Tangorra suggests tweaking that prompt to say: "As someone who loves trying out new cuisines and has a particular fondness of spicy food, can you suggest an exciting dinner menu for my next weekend get-together with my friends?"
If you want to apply ChatGPT to your business, Cressy suggests creating a "best-practices document" that includes details on who you are, what you do, and what your brand voice sounds like. That way, users can copy and paste the information into the chatbot whenever they start a new conversation.
Instead of asking ChatGPT to "create me a marketing strategy" the prompt should say "I am a world-class [role] who helps [target audience] for business growth. Our brand voice is friendly, positive, inspiring, brand-safe, conversational. Create me a marketing strategy to help build my brand on Facebook and Instagram by leveraging my podcast."
While it's best for prompts to be specific and include context, writing a long prompt can be counterproductive, Gulya said.
"More often than not, a long mega-prompt does not give the desirable output," he said.
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To avoid this, Gulya suggests breaking down the desired output into a series of steps. That way, if the chatbot generates errors, the user can pinpoint what exactly the chatbot may not understand.
" This allows you to validate each step before proceeding, course-correcting when necessary," Gulya said.
If the goal is to use ChatGPT to generate a widely read blog post, the user should ask the chatbot to first research which SEO terms will most likely make the article appear at the top of search-engine results. In a separate prompt, ask it to apply what it learned to the blog post.
To ensure your prompt is as thorough as it can be, Dean suggested asking ChatGPT what other details it needs from the user to produce the best output.
To do this, Dean suggests adding a line to your prompt that follows this template: "If I want to [desired outcome], what prompts should I share with ChatGPT in order to get the best results?"
Once ChatGPT has generated an output, tell the chatbot what you like and dislike about the output and ask it to "request additional results, edits, or tweaks," she said.
DeStefano-Tangorra suggests that ChatGPT users "explicitly outline your expectations within the prompt" by adding precise words.
"Clear and specific prompts lead to more relevant and useful responses," she said.
The prompt "compare and contrast using an oven versus a microwave for preparing dinner," should be tweaked to "can you compare and contrast the advantages and disadvantages of using a traditional oven versus a microwave for preparing a family dinner?"
To write your prompt with precision, Anna Bernstein, a prompt engineer at the generative-AI writing tool Copy.ai, suggests using a thesaurus to find the words that can increase your chances of getting what you want out of the chatbot.
"Don't give up on a concept just because your first prompt didn't get the result you wanted," Bernstein previously told Insider . "Often, finding the right word or phrasing can unlock what you're doing."
A thesaurus can help you find verbs that clearly express your intent. That way, the AI has a better chance of fully understanding your request, Bernstein said.
She said that a prompt including the phrase "condense this" is stronger than "rewrite this to be shorter."
While ChatGPT users may have different conversational styles, Gulya said he finds that talking to the AI using polite, direct language — as if he's writing to a friend — yields the best results.
"Doing so puts me in a more collaborative, more flexible mindset," he said.
When interacting with the chatbot for, say, advice on how college professors can enhance their skillsets, Gulya suggests writing flattering comments such as, "You're magnificent at seeing the root causes in faculty member's anxieties about artificial intelligence."
After the chatbot spits out a response you like, express gratitude by saying something like, "This is great. Thank you so much!" followed by a request to make revisions to its output.
If talking to ChatGPT like a friend doesn't produce desirable results, try adding some emotion to your prompts.
A study conducted by a team of researchers from Microsoft, William & Mary, and research centers across Asia found that adding phrases like "This is very important to my career" and "You'd better be sure" to ChatGPT prompts yield better responses.
ChatGPT users can also try writing prompts with phrases like "You'd better be sure," "Take pride in your work and give it your best," and "Remember that progress is made one step at a time. Stay determined and keep moving forward."
If you're using ChatGPT to generate copy or captions for social media posts, make sure to tweak its tone so the content resonates with your target audience, Ashley Couto, a marketing professional who uses the chatbot to reduce her workload, told Business Insider.
Couto finds that the best marketing copy reads at a fifth- or sixth-grade level, which includes "short sentences and paragraphs, a conversational tone, and simple language."
To do this, Couto recommends asking ChatGPT to "change the reading level and tone" after it spits out a response.
If you want ChatGPT to generate longer posts, Couto suggests giving the AI a specific structure and outline. She said the more specific you can be with your instructions, the better its output will be.
Here's one prompt Couto uses to generate a company blog post:
"Following this story structure — 1. Capture the heart, 2. Set up a tension, 3. Resolve the tension, 4. Conclude by offering value — write a 1,000-word story at a grade-five reading level in the first person using the following information."
Is ChatGPT making up answers that are factually incorrect? If so, adding bodies of text from trusted sources into the prompt may help eliminate these hallucinations.
OpenAI's prompt guide suggests copying and pasting articles into ChatGPT, and then asking the chatbot to answer questions based on them.
An example of a prompt OpenAI provides is "Use the provided articles delimited by triple quotes to answer questions. If the answer cannot be found in the articles, write 'I could not find an answer.' After that, insert the text from the article below, followed by the questions you want ChatGPT to answer."
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
assignments
“Assignments.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/assignments. Accessed 5 Jul. 2024.
Nglish: Translation of assignments for Spanish Speakers
Britannica English: Translation of assignments for Arabic Speakers
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COMMENTS
Task, project, assignment, job. Which one is correct in my case? These words don't have exact matches in Portuguese, so sometimes I get confused about their usage. When is it more suitable to use task rather than assigment and vice versa?
Synonyms for ASSIGNMENT: task, job, duty, project, mission, chore, responsibility, function; Antonyms of ASSIGNMENT: dismissal, discharge, firing, expulsion ...
Key Differences. A task refers to any piece of work or activity that needs to be done, typically implying a shorter, more immediate piece of work that can be part of daily responsibilities or projects. Whereas, an assignment is a piece of work or project allocated to someone, often as part of their studies or job, usually with a clear objective ...
Answer: Dear Ramiro, As you may know, both task and assignment are nouns describing an activity that you must complete. A task is something you have to do. An assignment is usually a task that someone gives you to do. Ways to use 'task'. A task describes an activity that can be done in your daily life. But you can give a task to yourself ...
7 meanings: 1. something that has been assigned, such as a mission or task 2. a position or post to which a person is assigned.... Click for more definitions.
ASSIGNMENT definition: 1. a piece of work given to someone, typically as part of their studies or job: 2. a job that…. Learn more.
[countable] a task or piece of work that somebody is given to do, usually as part of their job or studies. Students are required to complete all homework assignments. You will need to complete three written assignments per semester. a business/special assignment ; I had set myself a tough assignment.
assignment: 1 n an undertaking that you have been assigned to do (as by an instructor) Types: show 6 types... hide 6 types... school assignment , schoolwork a school task performed by a student to satisfy the teacher writing assignment , written assignment an assignment to write something classroom project a school task requiring considerable ...
Synonyms for TASK: job, duty, assignment, project, chore, mission, function, responsibility, endeavor, errand
assignment - WordReference English dictionary, questions, discussion and forums. All Free. ... such as a mission or task; a position or post to which a person is assigned; the act of assigning or state of being assigned; the transfer to another of a right, interest, or title to property, esp personal property ...
Synonyms for ASSIGNMENT in English: task, work, job, charge, position, post, commission, exercise, responsibility, duty, …
Assign tasks: Open the desired task, click "Assignee", and choose the right team member (s). Keyboard shortcuts: Hover over the task and press "A" to open the Assignee picker. Press the space bar to assign yourself.
How to use assignment in a sentence. Synonym Discussion of Assignment. the act of assigning something; a position, post, or office to which one is assigned… See the full definition. Games & Quizzes; Games & Quizzes; Word of the Day ... a specified task or amount of work assigned or undertaken as if assigned by authority. a homework assignment ...
What this handout is about. The first step in any successful college writing venture is reading the assignment. While this sounds like a simple task, it can be a tough one. This handout will help you unravel your assignment and begin to craft an effective response. Much of the following advice will involve translating typical assignment terms ...
Task assigning involves defining responsibilities and allocating resources for team members to complete a project effectively. While workplace leaders can assign tasks to team members in different departments, managers typically assign tasks to their department's members. Discovering each team member's strengths, potential, and expertise can ...
ASSIGNMENT meaning: 1. a piece of work given to someone, typically as part of their studies or job: 2. a job that…. Learn more.
ASSIGNMENT - Synonyms, related words and examples | Cambridge English Thesaurus
1 [countable, uncountable] a task or piece of work that someone is given to do, usually as part of their job or studies You will need to complete three written assignments per semester. She is in Greece on an assignment for one of the Sunday newspapers. one of our reporters on assignment in China I had given myself a tough assignment. a business/special assignment
An assignment is a task given to a specific person or group to complete.It can also mean the act of assigning.In some legal fields it can refer to the transferring of ownership of property. An assignation is the act of assigning or the actual assignment.But it also means a secret rendezvous for lovers, most especially for affairs or illicit relationships.
With task publishing in Microsoft Teams, operations managers and other business leaders can centrally define tasks and distribute them to the teams across your organization who must perform the work. You create a list on the Publishing page of the Planner app, add tasks to it, and then publish the list to the teams (locations) that you choose.
Integrations with Gmail and Google Calendar help you get tasks done—faster. Quickly capture tasks anywhere • Create task lists with your most important to-dos • View, edit, and manage tasks on the go, from any device • Manage tasks created in Gmail or Calendar on the web from your mobile device Add details and create subtasks
Existing privacy protection methods of task assignment have rarely considered the comprehensive protection of user privacy and focus primarily on single objective constraint condition. To address this issue, we propose a privacy-preserving multiobjective task assignment scheme (PMTA) to enable participants to obfuscate their sensitive data by ...
Synonyms for ASSIGN: task, entrust, charge, trust, impose, intrust, confer, allocate; Antonyms of ASSIGN: deny, retain, deprive (of), withhold, keep, begrudge ...
The task assignment optimization problem is formulated by taking into consideration dynamic network states, uncertain node computing capabilities and task arrivals, as well as the heterogeneity of the involved entities. We then develop and compare three task assignment algorithms, based on different deep reinforcement learning (DRL) approaches ...
Once you give ChatGPT a role, craft the prompt so it can accomplish a singular task such as writing a 300-word cover letter or generating a recipe for a protein-packed dinner. "Don't ask it to do ...
assign: [verb] to transfer (property) to another especially in trust or for the benefit of creditors.
Synonyms for ASSIGNMENTS: tasks, duties, jobs, projects, chores, missions, responsibilities, functions; Antonyms of ASSIGNMENTS: dismissals, firings, discharges ...