Sure, but my whole point was to reduce the micro managing, not increase it
I'm afraid to be the one to say it... but this is Dwarf Fortress. It is entirely micromanagement.
You can select areas to cut down trees in, and the woodcutter will do so until there are no more trees to harvest or there is insufficient stockpile space to store them. Any time a spot opens in the stockpile (as beds get made, for example), a dwarf will run out, grab the wood, and put it into place.
Honestly, a lot of management issues can be resolved by having large stockpiles for wood, bone/shell and so on. Just keep more than you need, and set secondary stockpiles up if you REALLY have a huge backlog(of log), and set the primary stockpile (by the carpenter) to take from the secondary piles. Then, the dwarves will automatically fill the primary with the secondary, if possible.
Fortunately, some tasks (collecting silk, tanning hides, weaving cloth from thread), default to fully automated processes, and you can put some tasks, (making rock blocks) on repeat without actually causing problems. Rock blocks are very useful for construction and training masons.
The job manager lets you make up to 30 things at a time, and the tasks will automatically queue up at the appropriate stations, so rather than jumping to your forge whenever the baron threatens to have someone killed if he doesn't get his lead thingy, j->m->q->lead gob->enter->1->enter will get the twit his precious thingamabobs, and hopefully lead poisoning.
It's not so bad when you get used to it, but improvements are certainly possible.