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Assign labels to tasks to visually organize them using colour.

Quick reference

Assign Labels to Tasks

Use colored labels to categorize tasks. 

When to use

We use labels as a way to categorize our tasks in our plan visually using color. We can assign custom labels to tasks and use the labels to sort and filter tasks. 

Instructions

Similar to Microsoft Outlook, we can use colored labels in Planner to categorize our tasks. This allows us to group tasks visually and we can use the search feature within Planner to find tasks by their label. 

Rename Labels

  • From Board view in Planner, open a task. 
  • Click in the Add label field. 

Planner will present a list of labels with default names based on their color. We can make these more meaningful by renaming them to something relevant to our project. 

  • Click on the pen icon to edit the label.  
  • Type a new name for the label. 
  • Repeat this process and rename as many labels as required. 

Assign Labels to Tasks

  • Open any task. 
  • Click in the Add Label field. 
  • Select a label to assign it to the task. 

We can add more than one label to each task if required. 

Filter and Group Tasks by Label

Filter Tasks
  • Click on the Filter drop-down in the top right-hand corner. 
  • Expand the Label section. 
  • Choose a label from the list.

The tasks will now be filtered so that only tasks assigned to that label will be shown. 

  • Click on the Filter drop-down. 
  • Click Clear to remove the filter. 
Group Tasks
  • Click the drop-down arrow next to Group by Bucket. 
  • Choose Labels from the list.

The tasks will now be grouped by their label.

Hints & tips

  • Labels will be displayed on the contact card. 
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  • 00:04 In the previous lesson,
  • 00:05 we saw how to categorize our tasks into different custom buckets.
  • 00:10 And in this lesson, I'm going to show you how you can assign labels to your tasks.
  • 00:15 Now, this is very similar to using things like categories in Outlook.
  • 00:19 So if you've ever used those, then you have a bit of a head start.
  • 00:23 Categories are just another way to organize our tasks using
  • 00:28 color to make them easier to find.
  • 00:30 So let's take a look at the current tasks that we have in the plan.
  • 00:34 Now, I've assigned these or I've moved these across into six different buckets.
  • 00:39 Now, maybe the first two buckets, Scope and Analysis,
  • 00:43 are part of phase one of this project.
  • 00:46 Design and Development are phase two, and Testing and Training are phase three.
  • 00:52 Now, I could use to indicate these different phases using labels.
  • 00:57 So let's go to the first task in the Scope bucket.
  • 01:01 I'm going to click to open it, and you'll notice right at the top,
  • 01:05 underneath where we have who's assigned to this task,
  • 01:08 we have a little text box here that says Add label.
  • 01:11 Now, if I click on this, I'm going to be shown the default labels in Planner.
  • 01:16 And you can see that these currently say, Pink,
  • 01:19 Red, Yellow, Green, so on and so forth.
  • 01:21 And that's fine, but these aren't particularly meaningful to me.
  • 01:23 So the first thing we're going to want to do here is if we do want to use labels,
  • 01:28 we're going to want to rename them so they make sense to us.
  • 01:31 Now, I'm not a huge fan of pastel colors,
  • 01:33 so I'm going to scroll down until we get to these bolder solid colors down here.
  • 01:38 First thing I'm going to do is I'm going to rename
  • 01:41 the label Cranberry by clicking on the pencil icon.
  • 01:44 So now, I can change this to Phase 1, and hit Enter.
  • 01:50 I'm then going to choose this one here,
  • 01:53 the Peach label, and I'm going to make this Phase 2.
  • 01:59 And then let's use the Light green label for phase 3.
  • 02:06 So now what I can do is effectively assign the correct label to this specific task.
  • 02:11 So this is in the Scope bucket, and that is Phase 1.
  • 02:15 Now, it's worth noting that you can assign multiple labels to a task, but
  • 02:20 in this example, we're just going to add one.
  • 02:22 Let's close this down.
  • 02:24 Now, I would go through the rest of the tasks in Scope and
  • 02:28 Analysis and assign all of those to Phase 1.
  • 02:31 If I go to Design, this time, I want these assigned to Phase 2.
  • 02:36 So I'm going to select that one for all of the tasks in that particular bucket.
  • 02:41 So I'm going to go through off camera, and
  • 02:43 I'm going to assign the correct label to all of the tasks in my project.
  • 02:48 And as a final point worth mentioning, similar to buckets,
  • 02:52 we can use the label to filter and find our tasks.
  • 02:55 So if we go back up to our filter in the top right-hand corner, we can scroll down,
  • 03:00 you can see we have Label just here, and it's going to show my three labels.
  • 03:04 So once I have a signed everything to these labels, and
  • 03:08 I just want to see all of the tasks for the part of Phase 1 of this project,
  • 03:12 I can select that specific label.

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