Best Practices in Naming and Organizing Dashboards
Introduction
Jira Dashboards are often the first thing users see when they log in—and often the last thing they understand well.
Despite their critical role in visualizing project health and team productivity, dashboards in Jira frequently become cluttered, duplicated, misnamed, or abandoned.
As a Jira administrator, I’ve seen firsthand how improper dashboard management can spiral into chaos.
In this article, I’ll outline common dashboard-related problems, dive into the importance of naming conventions, and share best practices.
I will also share a few Marketplace apps that can help to make a difference.
Common Problems with Jira Dashboards
1. Overcrowding and Redundancy
Dashboard proliferation is a common problem in very large Jira instances. Users often create dashboards for personal or specific purposes, but abandon them when the project ends.
Over time, when new dashboards are created without cleaning up the old leads to following issues:
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Countless numbers of dashboards
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Duplicate dashboards with slight variations
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Dashboards no longer in use but still shared globally
- Maintenance overhead multiples as administrators needs to manage an ever-growing collection of dashboards
2. Poor Naming and Organization
- Without a naming convention, dashboards become hard to find or differentiate.
- For example: Multiple dashboards named “Sprint Dashboard” or “Project Overview" or "My Dashboard"
- Most users do not fill in the description for the dashboard, making it difficult to determine the owner, purpose, or scope
3. Unmanaged Sharing Settings
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Dashboards are often shared with “Everyone” or "Any Logged-in Users" expose sensitive data
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Users unintentionally disclose confidential info via dashboard, filters or gadgets titles even without access to issues
4. Broken Gadgets
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Dashboards display errors due to deleted filters, projects, or mismatched permissions from the underlying filters
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Legacy gadgets (like gadgets from old plugins) may not be compatible after many Jira version upgrades
5. Performance Bottlenecks
- Dashboards with too many complex gadgets (e.g., JQL-heavy filters, pie charts across large datasets) can slow down performance for the entire system.
- High frequency refresh rate introduces unnecessary workload to the server especially for huge datasets
- Too many gadgets added in 1 dashboard
- Some gadgets are be unable to scale with the growth in the data volume over time
Why Naming Conventions Matter?
Compare the dashboard names on the left and right. Which ones do you think is better? Can you identify the improvement?
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Approach 1
|
Approach 2
|
|---|---|
| DRC | DRC: Testing Dashboard |
| 2025 Tracking | SUPPORT: Tracking (2025) |
| PMO Project | ITPMO: Project Dashboard |
| Project Overview | MCHART: Project Overview |
| Sprint Planning | DFOLDER: Sprint Planning |
| Monthly Project Review | ACJ: Project Review (Monthly) |
| IT Dept Quarterly KPI Review | [ITD]: KPI Review (Quarterly) |
| IT Dept Annual KPI Review | [ITD]: KPI Review (Annual) |
| Jira Usage Analysis Report Section A | [ITD]: Jira Usage Analysis - Part A |
From the examples below, you will realize that naming dashboards effectively is crucial for enhancing usability, facilitating discovery, and improving overall team collaboration.
A consistent naming scheme can
- Saves Time: Minimize the time spent searching for the right dashboard
- Speeds Discovery: Users find the right view instantly. Especially useful for onboarding
- Clarifies Ownership: Admins know who to audit or remind
- Scales Cleanly: New teams/projects slot in without collision
Based on extensive experience across multiple organizations, I recommend the following hierarchical naming convention for Jira Dashboards
Project Key/Business Unit: Purpose - Sub-purpose (Timeframe/Status)
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Component
|
Description
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|---|---|
| Project Key/Business Unit: |
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| Purpose |
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| - Sub-purpose |
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| (Timeframe/Status) |
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Do you see a better picture now?
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Approach 2
|
|---|
| DRC: Testing Dashboard |
| DFOLDER: Sprint Planning |
| SUPPORT: Tracking (2025) |
| [ITD]: KPI Review (Quarterly) |
[ITD]: Jira Usage Analysis - Part A |
Key Naming Principles
The naming structure encompasses the following principles
- Maintain a consistent naming format to avoid unnecessary confusion
- Use descriptive names to indicate what the dashboard is about
- Use full words instead of abbreviations unless they are widely recognized
- Include relevant keywords that people might search for
- Include temporal indictors to help users distinguish between current and historical dashboards
Usage of Aliases
To be fair, there is a reason why people prefers short names for dashboards. It is due to the Jira's UI design.
Long names are either partially obstructed or truncated due to the width of the side bar or menu bar.
This issue is addressed with the ability to define aliases for dashboards. The full name of the dashboard is no longer necessary when additional context is available through other forms
- Cascading dashboard menu - the names of parent folders will provide the hierarchical information and need not be repeated
- Project Sidebar - The project key can be inferred implicitly when it is appearing in the project sidebar
Ownership of Dashboards
Another common issue of outdated dashboards is because the dashboard can only be edited by the owner who has left the organization.
The only way is for Jira Admins to take over the ownership of the dashboards.
This usually does not happens because
- Users typically do not report the issue to the Jira admins
- It is easier just to duplicate a copy of the dashboard and continue on from there
- Jira admins are unaware or overloaded with other tasks
I have also included a possible solution to this problem in the best practices below.
Dashboard Governance Best Practices
1. Train Your Users
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Conduct workshops or provide documentation on:
- The naming convention policy
- How to create efficient dashboards
- When to request new dashboards vs reuse existing ones
- Link dashboards to projects for promote discovery and accessibility
2. Introduce Accountability through Ownership
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Every shared dashboard must have an active owner. Remove or reassign when someone leaves.
- Remember to grant "Editor" permissions for shared dashboards. You can add users who has Admin role for the associated Jira project
3. Limit Sharing Permissions
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Restrict dashboard sharing to specific groups/projects unless needed
- Avoid sharing to “Everyone” or “All Logged-in Users” by default
- Restrict public sharing of dashboards and filters since it could cause information disclosure on the Internet
4. Standardize Core Dashboards
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Maintain a set of officially sanctioned dashboards (e.g., project health, SLA performance, sprint reports).
- Add them into Dashboard Folders so that they can be accessed easily from the top menu bar
5. Use Templates for Consistency
- Provide users with “template dashboards” to clone for common scenarios (e.g., Scrum, Kanban, support teams).
6. Audit Regularly
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Review dashboards at least once every 6 - 12 months.
- Encourage users to delete unused dashboards
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Identify unused, orphaned or duplicate dashboards for housekeeping
Useful Apps
Here are some Jira apps which are useful for working with dashboards.
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App
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Key Benefits
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|---|---|
| Better PDF Exporter for Jira |
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| Dashboard Assistant for Jira Cloud |
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| Dashboard Folders for Jira |
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| Menu Gadgets |
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| Rich Filters for Jira Dashboards |
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Closing Thoughts
Dashboard management represents a critical but often overlooked aspect of Jira administration. As administrators, we play a key role in enabling scalable visibility, performance, and usability for all teams.
By enforcing clear naming conventions, regularly auditing dashboards, and using the right tooling, you can keep Jira dashboards streamlined, secure, and genuinely useful.
The strategy of combining folders (for macro-organization) with strict naming (for micro-clarity) will provide a foundation for building a sustainable dashboard ecosystem that will serve your organization effectively as it grows and evolves.
Do remember that dashboard management is not a one-time initiative but an ongoing process that requires continuous attention and refinement.
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Thanks!
Hua Soon SIM _Akeles_
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