JIRA Setup tips for several teams

[Anders Timsjö]

Hi,

I am working as a Scrum Master with a client where we use JIRA as ticket handling system.

In the company we have several teams(app, web, several backend teams).
I am wondering how we should organize our work in JIRA.
Should we all work in the same project or should each team work in a separate project and then we could use something like portfolio to coordinate all initiatives spanning the projects.
Right now some teams work in the same project but since the teams use different workflows I find it kinda messy.

Thanks in advance for any tips.

[Joe Pitt]

It depends on how you want them to work. JIRA doesn't have issue level security so if one member of the project can see an issue they all can. If you don't want them to see other issue types multiple projects may be the way to go. Normally a workflow would be for one or more issue types regardless of project. But a bug would have a different workflow than a task or CR. 

[Anders Timsjö]

I have no problem anyone seeing the each others tasks. But if we have different workflows I dont want to create different issuetypes to connect another workflow to. I want the main work to use Story and sub tasks as issue types. 

[Mary Ramirez]

Hi @Anders Timsjö,

It's important to determine whether the different teams will be tracking the same data or different data. Usually, different teams have different initiatives. Working out of different projects becomes more effective because each team can customize their projects workflow, screens, and issue types. 

I encourage you to separate the teams into their own projects and bulk move their issues.

[Anders Timsjö]

Thanks for the answer.

Yes I thought about this. But the teams sometime works on the same initiative or they all have to deliver something to realize a feature. 

We have another project right now were we break down Ideas to requirements(Epics, Storys) and move them to the respective teams. So to expand on that way of working it kinda make sense to have the teams work in separate projects. 

However we  are growing and will soon have two teams sharing workflow and really the same backlog and I think it makes sense for them to work in the same Jira project. 

[Mary Ramirez]

@Anders Timsjö,

The great thing about Jira is that issues can be linked to other issues in different projects. And workflows can be shared as well. But backlogs cannot be shared. If the projects were to be separated, creating a kanban board to show the backlog would be an alternative.