Assigning, Following, and Approving Tasks

This page outlines the main differences between:

These are three different ways that a user can be related to a particular task in Wrike. You may need help understanding the difference so that you can keep your team informed.

In some situations, it might make sense for a user to be an assignee, follower, and approver, all for one task. In others, only one role per user will be necessary. This table will help you understand which to use in different circumstances:

Assigning a task to a user indicates that they are responsible for some or all of the work required. Tasks can have any number of assignees, but we recommend keeping the number as low as possible so that responsibilities are clear — you can always create subtasks and assign them separately.

Assigning a user to a task automatically shares the task with that user.

Users who are assigned will receive an inbox notification when:

In addition, users who have been assigned a task can find that task in their My to-do folder, may see it in their AI Recommended tasks, and can use filters to see tasks assigned to them or any particular user. You can even create dashboard widgets that display tasks assigned to you or any other user.

Following is an appropriate option when a user needs to keep track of a task, but might not be directly responsible for its completion.

You can choose to follow tasks yourself, and set other users as followers of tasks. It's a great idea to add someone as a follower when you know they're not directly working on it, but need to be in the loop. Clicking on the Edit followers option of a task will show which users and user groups are following it and also the number of followers of the particular task.

When you're assigned a task or someone shares a task with you, you're automatically added as a follower to this task.

Users following a task will see any of these changes to the task in the Stream:

Dashboards provide multiple ways for monitoring your progress. For example, you can use the Followed tasks feature, which lists all the tasks you are tracking.

Set a user as an approver for a task when you need them to check it before proceeding with the next phase of work (publishing, sending to a client, submitting to another team, etc.).

You can make multiple users approvers of one task, and approvals can have due dates, files, and descriptions added. If your approver hasn't been part of the work process, it's a good idea to leave them a description so they know what they're assessing and why.

When you make a user an approver for a task, they will receive an inbox notification. They can then: