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On Hold vs Blocked

A practical guide for architecture studio workflows in Beech.

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16 August 2026

Updated 16 August 2026 · Beech Product Education Team

Blocked is an automatic wait on someone else. On Hold is a deliberate pause with a written reason you can defend later.

Intent: Explain on hold vs blocked in a way that a new team member can follow without prior Beech context.

Who this helps: Architecture studio admins, managers, and contributors who need a repeatable operational workflow.

Both columns mean the sheet is not moving. They mean different things, and Beech treats them differently on Home, in history, and in reports.

Blocked

Usually automatic: an unfinished dependency or a vendor request that is not Delivered yet. The assignee cannot usefully continue. When upstream finishes, Beech unblocks and notifies. You will also see it in the blockers feed on Home.

On Hold

A human choice: stop this to do something else. Beech requires a written reason before the move completes. Who paused it, when, and why are stored on the task. That trail is the answer when someone asks why a deadline slipped.

The task history can copy a hold/resume summary in one click. Use On Hold for priority, not for “waiting on structure” — that should be a dependency so Blocked stays honest.

Prerequisites

  • Confirm you can access the project and the page referenced in this workflow.
  • Collect any drawing references, due dates, and ownership details before you start.

Expected outcome

By the end of this workflow, your team has one visible, repeatable process and cleaner handovers.

Common mistakes and prevention

  • Mistake 1: Skipping context fields (owner, due date, status notes), which makes follow-up harder.

  • Mistake 2: Treating chat updates as source of truth instead of recording the update in Beech.

Troubleshooting checklist

  1. 1
    Troubleshooting step 1

    If a control is missing, verify your role has permission for the action.

  2. 2
    Troubleshooting step 2

    If results look wrong, check filters and refresh to confirm latest synced data.