Creating Task Templates for Recurring Work

Every sprint has recurring work: deployments, reviews, ceremonies, maintenance. Creating each task from scratch wastes time and risks forgetting important steps. Task templates let you capture best practices once and reuse them infinitely.

Recurring Task Patterns

Identifying Template Candidates

Template Qualification

IS THIS A GOOD TEMPLATE CANDIDATE?
══════════════════════════════════

FREQUENCY:
✓ Happens regularly (weekly+)
✓ Predictable schedule
✓ Multiple team members do it

STRUCTURE:
✓ Has defined steps
✓ Steps are mostly the same
✓ Checklist would help

PROBLEMS TODAY:
✓ Steps get forgotten
✓ Quality is inconsistent
✓ Takes time to set up each time
✓ Different people do it differently

GOOD CANDIDATES:
├── Sprint ceremonies (planning, retro, demo)
├── Deployments (staging, production)
├── Onboarding (new member tasks)
├── Maintenance (security patches, updates)
├── Reviews (code review, design review)
└── Client deliverables (weekly report, demo)

POOR CANDIDATES:
├── One-time projects
├── Unique creative work
├── Tasks with no standard process
└── Work that varies completely each time

Recurring Templates

Weekly Deployment Template

WEEKLY DEPLOYMENT TEMPLATE
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TITLE: [DEPLOY] Weekly Release - {date}

FREQUENCY: Every Tuesday

DESCRIPTION:
Weekly production deployment for accumulated changes.

## Included Changes
- [ ] List PRs merged since last deploy

## Pre-Deployment
- [ ] All CI checks green
- [ ] Staging verified
- [ ] On-call engineer identified: @
- [ ] Rollback plan confirmed

## Deployment Steps
1. Announce in #engineering
2. Create release tag
3. Deploy to production
4. Monitor for 15 minutes
5. Announce completion

## Post-Deployment
- [ ] Smoke tests passed
- [ ] Monitoring normal
- [ ] No error spike
- [ ] Team notified

## If Issues
- Rollback immediately
- Notify #incidents
- Create incident task

LABELS: deployment, recurring
DUE: Every Tuesday 2pm

Sprint Retro Template

SPRINT RETROSPECTIVE TEMPLATE
═════════════════════════════

TITLE: [RETRO] Sprint {number}

FREQUENCY: End of each sprint

DESCRIPTION:
## Prep (Before Meeting)
- [ ] Review sprint metrics
- [ ] Gather feedback async
- [ ] Book meeting room/link
- [ ] Send reminder

## Meeting Structure
1. Review previous actions (5 min)
2. What went well? (10 min)
3. What could improve? (10 min)
4. Action items (10 min)
5. Team appreciation (5 min)

## Outcomes
### Went Well
-
-

### To Improve
-
-

### Action Items
| Action | Owner | Due |
|--------|-------|-----|
|        |       |     |

## Follow-up
- [ ] Share notes with team
- [ ] Create tasks for action items
- [ ] Schedule next retro

LABELS: retrospective, sprint, recurring
ASSIGNEE: Scrum Master rotation

Monthly Maintenance Template

MONTHLY MAINTENANCE TEMPLATE
════════════════════════════

TITLE: [MAINT] Monthly Maintenance - {month}

FREQUENCY: First Monday of month

DESCRIPTION:
Regular maintenance tasks to keep systems healthy.

## Security
- [ ] Dependency vulnerability scan
- [ ] Security patch review
- [ ] Access audit (remove departed)
- [ ] Certificate expiry check

## Performance
- [ ] Database query analysis
- [ ] Slow endpoint review
- [ ] Resource utilization check
- [ ] Cost optimization review

## Cleanup
- [ ] Archive old branches
- [ ] Clean up stale PRs
- [ ] Remove unused feature flags
- [ ] Prune old logs/data

## Documentation
- [ ] Update runbooks if needed
- [ ] Review and update README
- [ ] Architecture diagrams current

## Infrastructure
- [ ] Backup verification
- [ ] Disaster recovery test (quarterly)
- [ ] Scale test (if needed)

LABELS: maintenance, recurring, infrastructure
ASSIGNEE: Rotating on-call

Auto-Creation Setup

Scheduled Templates

SCHEDULING RECURRING TASKS
══════════════════════════

GITSCRUM AUTOMATION:
─────────────────────────────────────

RULE: Create Weekly Deployment
TRIGGER: Every Tuesday at 9:00 AM
ACTION: Create task from template
TEMPLATE: Weekly Deployment
SETTINGS:
├── Due: Tuesday 2:00 PM (same day)
├── Assignee: @devops-rotation
├── Sprint: Current sprint
└── Notify: #engineering

RULE: Create Sprint Retro
TRIGGER: 1 day before sprint end
ACTION: Create task from template
TEMPLATE: Sprint Retrospective
SETTINGS:
├── Due: Last day of sprint
├── Assignee: Current scrum master
├── Sprint: Current sprint
└── Title includes: Sprint number

RULE: Create Monthly Maintenance
TRIGGER: First Monday of month
ACTION: Create task from template
TEMPLATE: Monthly Maintenance
SETTINGS:
├── Due: Friday of that week
├── Assignee: @infra-rotation
└── Labels: Add current month

Rotation Assignments

ROTATING ASSIGNEE SETUP
═══════════════════════

ROTATION: On-Call Schedule
MEMBERS: @alice, @bob, @carol, @dave
PATTERN: Weekly

TASK ASSIGNMENT:
├── Week 1: @alice
├── Week 2: @bob
├── Week 3: @carol
├── Week 4: @dave
└── Repeat

CONFIGURATION:
Recurring task → Assignee → Rotation
Select rotation schedule
Task auto-assigns to current person

NOTIFICATIONS:
├── Upcoming assignment (1 day before)
├── Assignment start
└── Handoff reminder

Template Variations

Template with Options

TEMPLATE WITH CONDITIONAL SECTIONS
══════════════════════════════════

DEPLOYMENT TEMPLATE (with options)

## Standard Sections
[Always included]

## Database Migration Section
[Include if: has-migrations checkbox selected]
- [ ] Backup database before migration
- [ ] Test migration on staging
- [ ] Prepare rollback script
- [ ] Schedule maintenance window

## Feature Flag Section
[Include if: has-feature-flag checkbox selected]
- [ ] Feature flag created
- [ ] Rollout plan defined
- [ ] Kill switch tested
- [ ] Monitoring for flag

## External Dependency Section
[Include if: external-api checkbox selected]
- [ ] Vendor notified
- [ ] Fallback behavior tested
- [ ] Timeout/retry configured

Best Practices

For Recurring Templates

1. Start with manual — Template what works
2. Include timing — When is it due?
3. Clear ownership — Who's responsible?
4. Auto-create — Less overhead
5. Review quarterly — Update what's changed

Anti-Patterns

RECURRING TEMPLATE MISTAKES:
✗ Creating manually each time
✗ No checklist (miss steps)
✗ Wrong frequency
✗ No clear owner
✗ Never updating template
✗ Too detailed (not followed)
✗ No notification (forgotten)

Related Solutions

• Creating task templates for consistent processes
• Configuring workflow automations
• Running effective sprint retrospectives