Big Book of Atlassian by Alex Ortiz: Tips for Jira Admins
If you’ve ever found yourself knee-deep in Jira workflows wondering whether you’ve just overcomplicated your life—or your company’s entire instance—you’re not alone.
As Jira grows with your organization, so does its complexity. Projects multiply, fields expand, automations stack up, and what once felt flexible starts to feel fragile.
That’s exactly the pain point Alex Ortiz’s Unofficial BIG Book of Atlassian addresses.
This isn’t just a reference guide — it’s part survival manual, part field guide, and part mindset shift for admins who want to keep their Jira environments efficient, scalable, and human-friendly. Let's unpack a few key insights then.
Why “Unofficial”?
Alex deliberately calls it unofficial to highlight that it’s not an Atlassian corporate publication — it’s built by the community, for the community. The tone is direct, practical, and deeply informed by real admin challenges.
The result is a guide that feels like a conversation with a fellow admin who’s already made — and fixed — every mistake you’re about to make.
It’s also beautifully structured, starting with Jira fundamentals, then moving through Service Management, Product Discovery, Confluence practices, Agile playbooks, and even a section on Forge app development. Each chapter combines practical checklists, “mistakes to avoid,” and example workflows that can be applied immediately.
1. Start with the Right Foundation
The first lesson seems deceptively simple but defines everything that follows: choose the right project type.
Your decision between Team-managed and Company-managed projects determines not just how flexible your setup is, but how maintainable it will be over time.
-
Team-managed projects are sandboxed and great for independent teams. They’re easier to configure, harder to break — but also harder to standardize.
-
Company-managed projects unlock shared workflows, permissions, and field schemes, allowing for governance and reporting at scale — at the cost of more maintenance discipline.
Advice:
“If you’re planning for collaboration or enterprise growth, go Company-managed from the start. Standardization beats convenience in the long run.”
It’s the difference between a flexible playground and a scalable platform.
2. Keep Workflows Simple — Not Stupid
Workflows are where Jira’s flexibility can turn against you. In his section “Workflow Mistakes to Avoid,” Alex delivers one of his core messages: complexity isn’t maturity.
Too many statuses — In Progress, Doing Work, Ready for QA, Waiting on Bob — don’t make your process more sophisticated; they make it harder to use and report on.
Rules for sanity:
-
Start simple: To Do → In Progress → Done.
-
Add stages only when they reflect a real business rule.
-
Avoid “spaghetti transitions” that connect everything to everything else.
-
Test in a sandbox first — always.
And most importantly: document what each status means. Many workflow conflicts stem not from poor design, but from people using the same term differently. A shared Confluence page explaining workflow semantics can prevent a thousand misunderstandings.
3. Don’t Drown in Custom Fields
Every admin’s rite of passage is creating a custom field they’ll later regret. Alex’s golden rule:
“If a standard field or existing context can do the job, don’t reinvent the wheel.”
Over time, small exceptions add up to massive technical debt. Fields multiply, performance drops, and reports become inconsistent.
Suggestions:
-
Audit your fields every few months.
-
Merge or delete duplicates.
-
Use global contexts wisely to reduce clutter.
Key takeaway: keep only what drives reporting, automation, or approvals. Jira runs faster — and teams work smarter — when there’s less noise.
4. Governance Beats Guesswork
Permissions and schemes are Jira’s hidden power structures. It's a clear warning that giving every team too much freedom feels agile at first — until your instance becomes unmanageable.
Instead, establish a lightweight governance framework:
-
Define global roles (Admins, Developers, Viewers).
-
Standardize naming conventions.
-
Apply permission schemes consistently across projects.
-
Limit project admin access to trained users.
💬 As Alex puts it:
“Not understanding the impact you can have on surrounding spaces is an easy way to really break things in Jira.”
This principle applies beyond permissions — to custom fields, work item types, and workflows. Jira isn’t a collection of silos; it’s an ecosystem. Changes ripple outward.
5. Build for Reporting, Not Just Execution
It’s easy to focus on making Jira do things — moving work items, triggering automations, enforcing approvals. But the author of Big Book reminds admins to design for insight.
Every configuration should answer a future question. Ask yourself:
-
Can my statuses and resolutions feed sprint and burndown reports?
-
Will my field types support dashboards and JQL queries?
-
Does my workflow structure tell a story in the data?
When you build with reporting in mind, Jira stops being a task tracker and becomes a decision engine.
6. Documentation Isn’t Optional
Documentation might not feel urgent — until you inherit someone else’s instance. Alex makes this point bluntly: “Jira isn’t complicated — until you forget why you did something.”
Using Confluence as your Jira knowledge base, document:
-
Status meanings
-
Field definitions
-
Workflow diagrams
-
Naming conventions
-
Admin decision logs
This transforms Jira from a black box into a shared language. It also empowers new admins to act confidently instead of guessing.
7. Automate Thoughtfully
Automation can either simplify Jira — or turn it into a runaway machine.
Alex's Top 5 Automation Rules include some easy wins:
-
Auto-assign new work items.
-
Notify stakeholders when transitions happen.
-
Auto-close stale tickets.
-
Mirror parent-child data where relevant.
-
Clean up old work items on schedule.
But his main caution: don’t automate bad design. Fix the underlying process first, then use automation to enforce it.
In short: automation should extend clarity, not confusion.
8. Think Like a System, Not a Space
Perhaps the book’s biggest mindset shift: treat Jira as a living ecosystem.
Every workflow, field, and permission scheme connects to something larger — teams, integrations, or external tools.
For admins working in hybrid environments — integrating Jira with systems like ServiceNow, GitHub, or Monday.com — this thinking becomes essential. A clean, well-governed Jira core makes every integration more stable and secure.
When you design with the system in mind, everything downstream benefits: automations run smoother, data stays consistent, and reporting finally makes sense.
9. Jira Is About People
What makes Big Book stand out most is its empathy. Beneath every configuration tip is a people principle: tools serve teams.
The best Jira admins aren’t just technicians — they’re facilitators.
They build clarity, remove friction, and make collaboration effortless.
“When people are empowered with the right knowledge,” Alex writes, “they can do their best work with confidence.”
That, ultimately, is the purpose of good administration.
Final Thoughts
Alex Ortiz’s Unofficial BIG Book of Atlassian isn’t just another admin manual — it’s a practical philosophy for running Jira environments that scale without losing sanity.
It’s comprehensive but approachable, technical but human. Every page feels like it was written by someone who’s been there: migrating projects at midnight, cleaning up fields, fixing broken workflows, and teaching teams why structure matters.
Whether you’re setting up your first instance or maintaining a massive one, the expert's lessons hold unique true:
keep it simple, document everything, and never forget who you’re building for.
So, take a moment today to look at your own Jira setup. What can you simplify, document, or automate to make tomorrow’s work smoother — for you and your team?
Was this helpful?
Thanks!
Kinga_Getint
3 comments