Including "In Review" Issues in Current Release via Automation Rule

[Sundram Trivedi]

Context: I have created an automation rule that triggers on sprint closure to

• Assign the Fix Version to all Done and In Review issues.
• Release the current version and create a new version for the next sprint.

Current Behavior:

• Only Done issues are considered for the current release.
• In Review issues move to the next sprint and appear as "Incomplete" in the sprint report.

Requirement: I want to include In Review issues in the current release as well.

[Aaron Morris]

Hi @Sundram Trivedi -- The root cause of your problem is that:

1. Jira only allows "completed" issues to remain in a sprint when it is closed. "Incomplete" issues must be moved (to the backlog, a future sprint, or a new sprint).
2. Jira only considers "completed" issues to be those in the last column of your sprint board. (See: Marking work items as complete )

👉 So, the technical solution to your problem may be to combine the "In Review" and "Done" statuses into the same (last) column on your board.

However, it's easy to imagine that it may confuse users, so it doesn't seem like a very good solution in terms of usability.

Your alternative is to update your workflow to match reality better. For example, if "In Review" items are truly done from a sprint-management perspective, perhaps the review work shouldn't be tracked on the sprint board. Or, if "In Review" items are not truly done from a sprint management perspective, perhaps it is appropriate that they are carried over to the next sprint? 

[Sundram Trivedi]

"The 'In Review' state is considered 'Done' from a development perspective, but PO testing is still pending before moving to the final 'Done' state. Since both 'In Review' and 'Done' indicate development completion, is there a way to reflect this while keeping them as separate statuses? We want to ensure the sprint progress accurately represents development completion while still tracking PO testing. Do you have any suggestions for handling this in Jira?"

[Aaron Morris]

@Sundram Trivedi -- Yes, the way to achieve that is by updating your sprint board configurations such that the "In Review" and "Done" statuses are both mapped to the last column of the board.

The impact will be that your PO tester(s) will not be able to move from "In Review" to "Done" by dragging across columns. Instead, they'll need to use the status dropdown in the Issue Details view.

Edit: I also want to add that this strategy makes PO Review sort of "optional" to your definition of done, which will create more inconsistent sprint velocities. And of course, more inconsistent velocities can make sprint planning more difficult. For that reason, it might be preferable to make PO Review either always part of "development complete" or never part of development complete. (Just something for consideration.)

[Sundram Trivedi]

Hi @Aaron Morris ,

Please correct me if I’m wrong, but based on your comment, our current workflow includes the following statuses: To Do, In Progress, Hold, In Review, and Done. Are you suggesting that since "In Review" and "Done" are already in the last column, the board setup follows your recommendation? However, the sprint does not consider "In Review" as completed. Could you clarify if any additional configuration is needed to include "In Review" in the sprint completion process?

[Aaron Morris]

Hi @Sundram Trivedi -- No other configuration should be necessary.

I just tested this by temporarily modifying my own sprint board to move my "Ready to Test" status into the final column, and the sprint immediately considers that status as "completed."

I'll show you how I tested it.  Perhaps I misunderstood something in your question?

Before change:

There are five items on the board:

• 1 in the To Do column
• 2 in the In Progress columns
• 1 in the Ready to Test column
• 1 in the Done column

When I close the sprint, it shows 1 completed item and 4 incomplete items:

Change:

Update the sprint board to move "Ready to Test" to the final column:

After:

There are now two items in the Done column, but they have the same statuses as before.  The sprint now considers the Ready to Test item to be "complete" instead of "incomplete."

 

[Sundram Trivedi]

Hi @Aaron Morris ,

Thank you for your suggestion and understanding! It’s a great approach, and I truly appreciate your insights. Since I’m new to Jira administration, I’m still learning the finer details.

I have one question: When you map the "Ready to Test" state to the last column, it seems that the column is no longer visible on the sprint board. Additionally, when an issue is moved to "Ready to Test," it directly goes to the "Done" column instead.

Is there any way to ensure that the "Ready to Test" column remains visible on the sprint board even after being mapped with "Done"? Also, when an issue's state changes to "Ready to Test," it should move to that column first instead of directly going to "Done" while still being marked as complete when the sprint is closed.

[Aaron Morris]

Hi @Sundram Trivedi ,

No problem at all. I'm happy to help. 🙂

Regarding your last questions:

Is there any way to ensure that the "Ready to Test" column remains visible on the sprint board even after being mapped with "Done"? Also, when an issue's state changes to "Ready to Test," it should move to that column first instead of directly going to "Done" while still being marked as complete when the sprint is closed.

No, that is not possible.  This is what I have been trying to explain. 🙂

The "complete" items of a sprint are only the items in the last (final) column. And you can't have a single item in two columns at once. (obviously)

So, you can't have it both ways. You must make a choice. Either your "In Review" items are:

• In the Done column (final column), thus declaring them "Sprint Complete."
• or they're not in the final column, thus declaring them "Sprint Incomplete."

I understand that this doesn't work well for your team. But again, Jira is just trying to push us to follow better agile practices:

• If your PO Reviewer is part of the sprint team, then their review should be part of the definition of done.
• If your PO Reviewer is not part of the sprint team, then their work shouldn't be tracked on the sprint board.

However, I also understand that we can't always follow perfect processes. That's why I suggested that your best workaround is:

1. Map the "In Review" status to the final Done column.  (As you observed, this will eliminate the separate In Review column.)
2. When an item is "development complete," it moves to the Done column with the status of In Review.
3. When (if) the PO Reviewer completes their review task during the sprint, they can change the status from In Review to Done.  (This will cause the status label to update, but the item will not change columns on the sprint board.)

The above solution gives you everything you want except for the separate column for In Review.

I hope this helps!