The Minimum Viable Asana Setup for Solopreneurs
Stop Overcomplicating Your Systems
Most solopreneurs don’t need another complicated tool. What you need is a simple system you can open up on Monday morning and know exactly what needs to happen that week. No feature overload. No clicking through six dashboards. Just clarity.
This article covers what I call the “Minimum Viable Asana (MVA)”.
Think of it as the starter version of Asana that’s built to actually stick with you.
You can launch it in under a week, it covers 95% of your task management needs, and it grows with you when you’re ready to delegate.
Step 1: The Three Projects Every Solopreneur Needs
You don’t need fifteen boards to run your business. You really only need three:
Client Work – Every deliverable, follow on proposal, or recurring service task lives here
Content & Marketing – Track ideas, drafts, and publishing dates without sticky notes all over your desk or flags on your calendar
Admin & Operations – Invoices, bookkeeping, renewals, and “don’t forget to…” tasks
This trio keeps everything in one place: what you deliver, how you make yourself visible, and the admin glue that holds it all together.
Step 2: The Five Essential Fields
Custom fields are nice to have, and not required for every business need. Below are features offered in every subscription level Asana offers, including the free version.
Start lean with these:
Assignee – Who owns it (often just you at first)
Due Date – When it actually needs to be done by, even if it’s a guess
Frequency – One time or recurring
Who it’s for – This is apparent by the project the task lives in
Definition of Done/Link – Short, two sentence description of what to do and a place to drop your Google Doc, Canva file, or Zoom link.
With these items, your tasks stop being vague reminders (“Website” 🤔) and become actionable instructions (“Draft About Page copy – Publication ready with Google Doc linked”).
Step 3: The 15-Minute Weekly Habit
Systems only work if you use them consistently. That’s why I recommend a short weekly ritual:
Open Asana
Clear or reschedule overdue tasks
Review this week’s list against your real capacity
Add in any new tasks from sticky notes, email, or that popped into your head this weekend
Get things done
Fifteen minutes buys you five days of clarity.
Step 4: When to Add a VA Handoff Board
Eventually, most solopreneurs bring in a VA for admin or client support. That’s when a fourth project your, VA Handoff Board, makes sense.
This is where your minimum viable set up starts to REALLY pay off
Tasks are already verb-first (“Send invoices”)
They’re also already documented with a clear definition of done (“Double-check payment links, attach PDF, confirm by email”)
Simply create a VA Handoff Project and cross “cross home” relevant tasks to your VA for the first 30 days. After that, the VA is “released” into your larger Asana workspace and their handoff project is for 1:1 prep and follow up
You’ll never explain the same thing five times. It’s all there for them
Case in Point
One of my recent clients, a SaaS company owner, had all of her regular tasks in an over-designed project management tool. Just opening the tool in the morning overwhelmed her, and she couldn’t unplug without worrying something would fall through the cracks.
After her Workflow Reset, she had three clean projects in Asana and a VA Handoff Board.
The next week, her VA sent out a batch of invoices without a single Slack ping for clarification.
Her words? “I should have hired you sooner.”
Why “Minimum Viable” Matters
When systems are too heavy, we avoid them.
When they’re too light, they feel like busy work and we let them languish.
The Minimum Viable Asana setup hits the sweet spot: light enough to adopt in a single day, strong enough to scale when you’re ready.
Ready to Build Your MVA?
Your brain is not a project management system. Stop juggling email, sticky notes, and Trello boards that don’t talk to each other.
In one week, you could have a clean, calm Asana workspace that gives you clarity and confidence.
👉 Book a free Mini Audit today and I’ll show you exactly where your system is breaking down and what a simple reset could do for you.