Am I able to create 2 different hierarchies using Jira and Advanced Roadmaps?

[Lara Arthur]

What I am looking to do is have 2 add'l hierarchy levels and allow 1 level from the top (as shown below - Feature) be available to use if wanted/needed.

Reasoning behind this is that some of our teams are looking for additional granularity between the Organizational level and the Epic level..in addition to other reasons. So some teams will use an additional Feature level to further disect work...and some will not need it. 

I have this hierarchy set up in Advanced Roadmaps (ARs) but the Parent/Child links don't work the way I was envisioning...ie if I try to set the parent of an Epic to a Portfolio Epic, Jira will only show the Feature issue type.

The only reason the Epic is showing up in below the PE is because I updated the hierarchy in AR (to include the additional Feature level) after I had put a plan together. 

Created the following hierarchy:

1. Portfolio Epic
2. Feature
3. Epic
4. Story

Does anyone know of a way to accomplish what I'm trying to here? 

I had tried to see if I could use ScriptRunner to add another hierarchy level...but could not figure out how to do that.

Any assistance/thoughts would be wonderful!

[Dave Rosenlund _Trundl_]

Hi, @Lara Arthur. Unless something has changed very recently with Advanced Roadmaps (aka Portfolio), it's not possible to have different hierarchies with different plans for different teams.

There are several Jira Data Center apps that can help you do this, though.  One of them is Structure for Jira.  In fact, Structure is uniquely designed to adapt Jira to the way organizations already manage their projects today (or how they might manage them in the future). There is no prescribed hierarchy.

With Structure, you create a spread-sheet-like blank canvas (called a structure) where you can have different hierarchies for different teams together in a single portfolio-level view of your organization. The optional Structure.Gantt extension can help you visually plan your projects using a familiar Gantt chart that's designed for use in Agile projects (or, non Agile projects).

Full disclosure, I work for the company that makes Structure & Structure.Gantt  ;)   

I hope this helps. If you decide to have a look, let us know if we can help via structure@almworks.com.

-dave [ALM Works]

[Lara Arthur]

@Dave Rosenlund _Trundl_ thanks for the info, but we've already purchased Advanced Roadmaps...so purchasing another tool is not an option.

[Dave Rosenlund _Trundl_]

Sadly then, you'll have to try to get your teams to adapt to the Advanced Roadmaps way of doing things. 

If it makes you feel any better, you're not alone in this. There are many threads here on the community on this topic. 

Best of luck to you.  

[John Funk]

Hi Lara,

I have not tried to add two levels yet, but I am suspicious that it is enforcing a rigid structure where each level must be in place. In other words, to have a Portfolio Epic, it must have a Feature, too, for the Epic to be attached. Just guessing though. 

[Lara Arthur]

@John Funk thats kindof what I'm thinking as well. The problem is we have projects that follow a standard for releases and other projects that don't follow that same standard...but both will be using Advanced Roadmaps. We also have teams that may not need to use the Feature level, so I was trying to see if they could "skip" a level and still use AR with that different hierarchy level. Would be nice if there was a way to "trick the system" or compensate for it another way, ie turn off that hierarchy level when not needed.

[John Funk]

It might be best in that case to create separate plans for each structure?