The “Kodah Clean-Up” focuses on making ClickUp more straightforward and honest by removing anything that obscures reality, confuses users, or distorts data. The quickest way to improve most workspaces isn’t by adding more features—it’s by clearing out the clutter that prevents the system from functioning as a true operating system.
1. Vague and Duplicative Statuses
One of the biggest issues in many workspaces is status overload: multiple versions of “doing,” several variations of “blocked,” and a “done” that everyone interprets differently. These ambiguous or redundant statuses clutter boards, make everything look busy, and offer little real insight into progress. They also disrupt reporting and automations, forcing ClickUp to interpret subtle differences between statuses like “waiting on client” and “waiting on us.”
A Kodah-style clean-up replaces all these variations with a concise, honest set of statuses that reflect observable reality, such as “To Do,” “Doing,” “Waiting on Client,” “Blocked,” and “Done.” Anything that doesn’t contribute to a real decision is removed or renamed so that every status change reflects genuine movement.
2. Wild Custom Fields and Tags
Many older or inherited workspaces are full of random custom fields and tags created in the moment—labels like “Temp,” “Q3_urgent,” or “New-new pipeline”—that were never reviewed or standardised. These create confusion for new team members, fragment your data, and make reliable dashboards nearly impossible to build. If no one can explain a field’s purpose in a single sentence, it’s probably time for it to go.
The clean-up process reduces this noise by creating a streamlined, shared schema: one unified priority model, a small set of meaningful tags, and a curated list of fields used consistently across all spaces. Redundant fields are hidden or retired, and only the essentials are incorporated into the new structure.
3. Dead spaces, outdated lists, and cluttered views
Abandoned spaces and old lists function like messy junk drawers—everyone knows they exist, but no one really knows what they contain or whether they still matter. They create uncertainty (“Is this the active project or something old?”) and make the workspace feel heavier than it should. The same applies to unused personal views that no one understands or relies on.
In a Kodah Clean-Up, anything genuinely obsolete is archived instead of being left to gather dust in the active hierarchy. Near-duplicate lists are merged, and views are cut down to a clear, shared set for common needs (like “Today,” “This Week,” “Planning,” “Leadership,” etc.). The aim is for a new hire to open ClickUp and instantly know where to go—without guessing.
4. Zombie automations
Over time, workspaces accumulate “ghost” automations: rules built for old processes that still run quietly in the background, or half-broken flows no one wants to touch. These trigger random status changes, odd notifications, and a general sense that ClickUp is doing mysterious things behind the scenes.
The clean-up process disables or removes any automation that isn’t clearly documented and actively useful. What remains is a small, intentional set of rules tied directly to your real processes—auto-assigning by type, moving tasks between stages, nudging on SLAs, and triggering hand-offs. When every automation has a known purpose, people stop resisting the system and start trusting it.
5. Folder and space sprawl
Many workspaces are structured around how the company used to operate—or worse, around whoever originally set things up. The result is a confusing maze of spaces by team, initiative, client, or region, all overlapping. People duplicate work simply because they can’t tell where the “right” place for it is.