Custom Fields, set value from parent

It would be great to be able to set a custom field in a task to take the value of the same field in that tasks parent item. I am using a form to create projects from a blueprint. I have a client field that is on both the project and the tasks. When the form is submitted, the field is filled out in the project, but not the tasks under it. I would love to have the ability for the field to be filled in for both. It could be and automation option. When task is created, set field to parent value, or something like that.

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Comments

Juan Muttoni

Hi @Russell Sprague, thank you very much for sharing this idea with us! May I kindly ask you to elaborate a bit more on your use case so we can better understand it and potentially find a solution for you?

Looking forward to your reply!

Russell Sprague

Hi @[Deleted User]

So in the situation above, I have a custom field for my project called "client". I have a blueprint for this project with some tasks under it, and they all have the client field. The project gets created by a request form were the client is set. The field in the request form is linked to the "client" custom field, so it sets the field in the project, but not in the tasks. It would be nice if the field in the tasks could get set at the same time, either by the form, or by the field that is in the parent project.

Does that make sense?

Sarah Klaeren

Hello,

we have exactly the same requirement.

We would also like to insert the content of various user-defined fields from the main project to all subprojects and subtasks. Some user-defined fields contain data that is the same for the whole project e.g. in our case indication of the manufacturer, material group etc.. Therefore this info should appear the same in all subprojects and subtasks in the user-defined fields.
In addition, it would be important that when changing the content in the main project, the info is also changed in the subprojects, -tasks. So there is a parent-child relationship between the fields.

Does this function already exist?

Thank you and many greetings,
Sarah

Juan Muttoni

Hello @Russell Sprague and @Sarah Klaeren! Thank you very much for your detailed responses. I'm afraid that currently, it is not possible to automatically copy the values of the parent project to the tasks contained in it. You can easily copy these values by dragging the relevant cell in the New Table View:

It is also possible to create an automation rule to 'copy' the value of the custom fields but only between tasks. This means that it wouldn't be possible to use the value of a custom field at the project level and produce an action at the task level.

In case you'd like to automatically 'copy' the value of a custom field task into other tasks, it would be necessary to create a rule where the trigger would be the value of the custom field, and the action should be to change the custom field to the desired value. Just to avoid any confusion, I'd like to clarify that this rule would not strictly copy the values, since there's not an action to 'copy' values. The rule changes the value of a custom field based on another custom field value and if the values are the same, we could consider that the values are being 'copied'.

I hope this information helps. Please, let me know if you have any additional questions!

Laura Svanera

any news about the creation of this request in Wrike? we would really like the feature as well

Basudha Sakshyarika

Hey Laura! 👋🏼

Thanks for checking in. Currently, this feature suggestion is not on the roadmap for this year, but rest assured, we will update you if there is any progress. 👍

You can also check out a similar thread here and follow it for the latest updates. Thank you!

Russell Sprague

@Basudha Sakshyarika thanks for linking the other post

Stephen Barnecut

For the record, I would like not just custom fields to cascade from parent to child tasks/projects. For example, some tasks should inherit the assignee of the parent.

Basudha Sakshyarika

@Russell Sprague: Happy to help! 😊

@Stephen Barnecut: It makes sense to have certain default field values cascade from parent to child as well. Thank you for taking the time to share your feedback. I have passed this information along to the product team. 🤝

Anthony O'Donnell

+1. Useful for us too. Thanks to all who have contributed to this page.

Glenn Scott

+1. Useful for us too. The fact that it has been requested since 2018 in other inquiries astounds me. I was really looking forward to using custom fields. But not having this type of control over the fields and a few other oversites is leading me to suggest to the company we switch to another product.

Even if you could set the field to only be visible on a custom content type would work for us. But the only options are projects, tasks, folder. no custom types available to limit where the data is.

Or even the ability to create an automation that says on custom field change you have 2 options. Copy data across all projects tasks, folders and overwrite any data or copy new data to blank fields only in tasks, folders, projects. That way someone has the ability to overwrite.

Rohan V

Hello!🙋

@Anthony O'Donnell, thanks for adding your upvote 👍

@Glenn Scott, thanks for the +1 as well, and for sharing your honest feedback. I understand it can be disappointing when a feature you find useful isn’t available.

As outlined in our Product Feedback guidelines, we have a voting system that is based on a minimum of 60 votes. Reaching this threshold ensures that the Product Team will provide an update, but it does not mean that your feedback must have 60 votes before being considered, although a higher vote count does help demonstrate the idea’s popularity.

We are now forwarding your feedback to the responsible team, and we will post an update if there are any developments. Thanks again, for your understanding.

Cyrus Hannibal

Patiently awaiting this resolution, without it our team is trying to keep up with all the clicking and dragging necessary to keep every task up to date when it could be as simple as updating at the project level and having the subtasks flip to match.

We use custom fields as metadata (SMEs, facility, project complexity, target ship dates, etc) so any time a custom field is shifted all subtasks need to be updated to keep our reports and dashboards accurate. Essentially every task we do needs some amount of information from the parent project so the lack of this parent /subitem Automation is leading to three issues. Inaccurate data, cumulative hours of updating Wrike each month, or sporadic updates by one individual when someone wants to view a specific report.

Eric

THIS! This honestly would set Wrike apart from all other platforms. Some can do it by automation (but then tick against your automation amounts for every field), if it's built in as a rule or a setting, you're golden. This is what's preventing me, in my few days of testing functionality, from moving my organization to Wrike, as this is a key feature we're looking for.

Ward Seward

I also would love this feature. Passing or reusing values is a must for a real form workflow. Heck, even just giving all custom fields a label to call (e.g. %customfield2%) would work and should be easy enough to implement. See MailChimp for a good example.

@Rohan V Does Wrike consolidate all the various requests across the community that are asking for this? If not, you need to. There are WAY more than 60 requests asking for this function in some form or fashion.

Rohan V

Hi @Cyrus Hannibal, @Eric and @Ward Seward 👋

Thank you so much for sharing your valuable thoughts and detailed feedback. We regularly review community suggestions, and each comment is shared with our Product Team.

While we are unable to merge similar threads into one, we continuously monitor and consolidate feedback internally. Our team is aware of similar suggestions, such as - Allow Request Form Custom Field to Cascade to All Tasks in a Project.

If there are any developments, we will update this thread and include the information in our Weekly Release Notes, which you can follow for the latest announcements.

Thanks again for your patience and understanding. We value your continued input!

Asheen Jain

To confirm has this reached the 60 vote threshold at least? Again this is something that we need as a new customer to WRIKE and having to develop this via API is a huge pain and has the same concerns

Asheen Jain

I guess conversely is there a way to create a dashboard report that allows displaying of Project or parent task custom fields to it's tasks/subtasks?

Basudha Sakshyarika

Welcome to the Wrike Community, @Asheen Jain, and thank you for your feedback! 😊

We’ll have more clarity on this suggestion as our product team works on the roadmap for the coming year, and we’ll be able to provide an appropriate status soon. For now, there are no further updates.

To answer your second question: Dashboards do not roll up or display custom fields from a parent project or task onto its child tasks or subtasks. However, as a workaround, you can use Table view to mass edit cells by dragging the needed value across the column. You can find more information on this here.

Let me know if you have any other questions! 👍🏽

Diego Silva

Me an my team would also love this feature, is there a way to know if you have it in your list and is moving or is still in TBD?

Katelyn Pullman

Hi Juan, can you give more details on your proposed automation work around?

Vicky_V

I have use case for this as well too. Upvoted. Any update?

Reid Williamschen

Our organization would also benefit from this functionality.

Joe Hendricks

UpVote +1 - I have a project needing this feature as well and found the thread.