The Kanban board setup that actually gets sh*t done

A field‑tested blueprint for anyone juggling more ideas than hands.

For the past four years I’ve run every marketing operation inside a SaaS, an agency, and a venture studio spinning up multiple SaaS products.

And I always default to a Sprint board borrowed from engineering. My tool of choice is Asana, and the first thing I do when I join a new team is fire it up.

What follows is the playbook I’ve refined the hard way, moving from "everything lives in my head" to "anyone can jump in and ship".

Sprint boards for marketing teams

Agile isn’t just for engineers. Marketing work has to ship just as fast. In my world, if a task isn’t in Asana with a clear owner + deadline, it doesn’t exist.

Our brains excel at big visions and flop at the tiny, sequential wins that make visions real. A good board forces strategy into bite‑sized execution.

This post is not sponsored by Asana.

The Core Columns (Left → Right)

1. Blocked / On Hold – Waiting on dependencies / Killed until further notice.

2. Requests – Raw, unbriefed ideas straight from meetings.

3. Backlog – Anything 2+ weeks out.

4. Next Sprint – Lined up for next week.

5. Projects – Long‑running, multi‑subtask initiatives.

6. This Sprint – This week's commitments.

7. Recurring Tasks – Weekly or monthly staples.

8. Completed – Done and dusted.

Where do Subtasks live?

Subtasks stay attached to their parent card. Drop them in This Sprint, Next Sprint, or Backlog based on due date, but never detach them. The parent card is your single source of truth.

The “Personal Tasks” Problem

Even with a pristine Project board, people default to their My Tasks view and miss the bigger picture. They need to see their lane and the highway. Your board must make ownership obvious while providing a shared reference space for cross‑team context.

Often, that means the project lead walks everyone through the Master Project board during stand‑ups to keep momentum and accountability, while individual contributors dive straight into their task list—now armed with clearer context.

Context-driven organisation

Depending on your business, here are a few ways to go about it.

Campaign‑Heavy (Agencies)

• Calendar view is home base.

• Kanban feeds the calendar.

• Spreadsheet dashboards keep clients in the loop.

Product Development (Start‑ups)

• Project‑centric lanes tied to the roadmap.

• Feature templates keep releases consistent.

• Marketing tasks trigger off dev milestones.

Service Businesses

• Client‑specific boards.

• Template‑driven deliverables.

• Clear intake & triage.

The 3 layer cake 🎂

I landed on a three-layer approach:

Layer 1: The Master Board (Leadership View)

• High-level projects only

• Cross-functional dependencies

• Resource allocation visibility

• Strategic timeline view

Layer 2: Team Boards (Execution View)

• Department-specific workflows

• Individual assignments clear

• Templates for recurring work

• Progress tracking mechanisms

Layer 3: Individual Views (Personal Productivity)

• Custom filters for each person

• Personal due dates and priorities

• Integration with personal workflow preferences

• Minimal cognitive overhead

Key principles

1. Templates save brains. Stop reinventing wheels.

2. Context lives in the parent. Subtasks are for doing, not documenting.

3. Show the right altitude to the right people. Leadership needs portfolio view; executors need task view.

4. Integrate or die. Calendar, comms, reporting—your board must talk to them all.

The "perfect" Kanban system doesn't exist.

What matters is finding the right balance of structure and flexibility for your team's working style and project types.

Ship a simple version, let the team live in it, and add complexity only when it removes friction. A basic system everyone uses beats a sophisticated ghost town.

What works for you? Comment below.