Creating Project Management Workflows With n8n

I’m not like my brother or my friends, I don’t have a crippling sports gambling addiction, but I still need to fill my time with activities that engage my brain. However I run into the issue of biting off more than I can chew, I have more half-finished projects laying around than Da Vinci if he had the same memory issues Drew Barrymore had in 50 First Dates. Great Film.

n8n makes creating automated workflows so quick, easy, and fun – I keep coming back to it every-time I want to do something repetitive. The first big one I’ve created was something all busy people can be sold, a productivity solution. This relatively simple and very flawed n8n workflow has become my first stop each and every time I have a new project I want to start. Its just good enough and consistent enough to be useful to me as an unemployed solo developer trying to stay relevant. I’m great at starting projects but I need the organizational infrastructure to follow through on them without getting bogged down in the minutia of figuring out the “where was I and what needs to get done” when I switch gears from one project to another.

Workflow Functionality

• Create Project – Using an n8n form the user fills out some basic project detials, the workflow generates the files (Task Tracker in Google Sheets and Notes in Google Docs) within a specified folder in their Google Drive. The project description is passed to the AI node which generates Tasks in a structured format so that the Google Sheet that was created can be filled out with the tasks that were generated.
• Update Project Details – Allows user to adjust the details of a project and Edit, Delete, & Complete tasks that are added to n8n forms dynamically with the use of the JS nodes. Also allows the user to view the whole project details on a webpage. Note: generating dynamic forms to allow for the user to Edit, Delete, or Complete multiple tasks at a time was not possible at this time, when the user performs one of those actions on a task they will be re-directed to the part of the workflow where they decide which action to perform.
• Complete Project – User completes a project via the n8n form and the workflow will generate a form with any remaining tasks that aren’t already “completed” or in “blocker”; the user will decide what to do with them. Once tasks are cleared, the Google Drive will transition the files in the directory over to the “Completed Projects” directory with the updated tasks.

Data Storage

All documentation and project data are stored in Google Drive. The tasks are stored in Google Sheets that are generated and managed by the workflow, the tasks within those sheets are used in other workflows such as my Daily Schedule Generator. Ideally the user should never need to go into Google Drive to manage the data. Right now with version 1 that isn’t the case, but version 2 should get us there.

Although this workflow is not yet useful for others…

Version two will… not be the one that I can hopefully share with other humans to test and see it sparks any joy with them or if I have to go all Marie Kondo on the workflow to make it marketable. Hopefully that will be version 3 which will be up on its own website on AWS, which needs to happen, I can’t use my wordpress blog as a project management platform. The more I use it, in its current form, the better it gets for me. Therefore, I need to make a good faith effort to take steps towards making it more dynamic in v2, and take more steps to make it usable for others in v3 before I go too far down the “This is just for Jimmy” rabbit hole. Two paths diverged in a github repo, one was forked a million times the other was never even looked at again by the guy who made the repo, and that has made all the difference. I am genuinely curious about using AI to hold my hand while I’m trying to get experience doing the full project lifecycle, so far so good. The same factors that indicated success prior to AI taking over everything are still there; diligence, perseverance, honesty, curiosity, experimentation, good documentation, and a desire to take pride in the final product all continue to remain steadfast contributors when producing high-quality work. AI can very easily make us lazier, or it can be gasoline on the fire of creativity. Its not the tool, its how you use it.