As your Product Team developed JPD, how did you track the cost?

[Carolyn McNicoll]

One major challenge organizations have with working in agile ways is understanding the cost.  Every large organization I've worked with struggles to let go of the old project management budget tracking.  One reason for this is they won't reorganize the company into collaborative cross functional teams that are able to deliver without handoffs to other teams.  And they don't revisit their accounting practices or strategy and planning methods that also need to learn from the agile ways of working.  

Tanguy Crusson mentioned in his JPD videos that you work in cross-functional autonomous teams.  With the focus on Product and Outcomes, do you track the cost by Outcome?  Is it a simple equation of Monthly team cost * number of months to do the work, from Idea to Delivery (Wonder to Impact)?  

It would be great if via the Atlassian tools, with JPD and Atlas/Home we could enable simplified planning and cost calculations.  Similar to how you've shared the JPD journey, working with customers, and building off the feedback loop, then providing the JPD Handbook, it would be beneficial to help companies learn how to do continuous planning by product outcomes and then wrap it up with the cost per product outcome.  

No more quarterly planning (that is changed hours after decisions are made) and no more financial gymnastics chasing dollars and hours by person trying to determine the project cost.

[Anastasiia Maliei SaaSJet]

Hi @Carolyn McNicoll 

This is a critical topic, especially for organizations shifting toward product-led, outcome-focused approaches while still needing visibility into the financial side of delivery.

You're right: many teams are trying to overlay traditional budgeting models onto agile workflows, which often leads to friction between product, planning, and finance teams.

How We Bridge the Gap: From Idea to Cost

In our team, we start by using Jira Product Discovery (JPD) to collect, explore, and prioritize product ideas. It’s a powerful tool for early-stage thinking, stakeholder collaboration, and shaping direction based on potential value.

However, as you've noted, JPD isn’t designed for tracking time or calculating delivery costs—and that’s completely fine. The real value comes when we connect it with execution data further down the line.

Here’s how we close the loop:

• We link delivery tasks to selected JPD ideas once they move into execution.
• Then, using Time & Cost Tracker for Jira by SaaSJet, we track:
  • Logged hours on those delivery tasks
  • Billable or internal rates for each contributor
  • Additional direct expenses (e.g., licensing, vendors) if relevant

This gives us a clear view of how much it costs to release a single idea, from discovery to delivery.
We sometimes call it: "How much does it cost to ship an idea from JPD?" 🚀

🔎 Tools That Help

• 💼 Track team capacity and cost: Assign salary or billing rates per user, set effective dates, and calculate actual vs. planned budgets for initiatives or outcomes.

• ⏱️ Log time manually or via automation: Time can be tracked on Jira issues across projects (JPD + Software), and then tied back to the relevant ideas or outcomes.

• 📊 Generate reports by product area, epic, or sprint: Even if teams are cross-functional, you can filter time and cost per stream of work using JQL or labels.

• 🔐 Keep finance and delivery in sync: Control access to sensitive data like user rates and costs, while letting teams use the tools naturally within Jira.

You can also export this data or use the API to feed dashboards in Power BI or Atlas for broader planning visibility.

In agile cross-functional setups, this light-touch integration helps surface real cost information naturally—without extra reporting layers or manual work.

[Carolyn McNicoll]

@Anastasiia Maliei SaaSJet thank you for the feedback and example of what you are doing.  It seems like a good step forward.  But what I was hoping for is a way to STOP using timesheets for cross functional autonomous teams and simplify the whole process of Agile Capitalization.  

I attended an excellent webinar a few years ago from Rego Consulting that explains the benefit of doing this when moving to product outcomes instead of project delivery.  They taught the attendees how to do it, and provided a detailed slide deck.  I see they now also have a recording from a client who did what they recommended and are sharing how they did it and the benefits realized.  I will provide links in case you are interested.  

I haven't yet found an organization ready to commit to this change, but it seems such a clear process improvement to me, that it's hard to understand the hesitation.  That's why I was hoping we could find a way to make it easier for clients with the use of JPD and other Atlassian products, while teaching them the benefit of cross functional autonomous teams and Agile Capitalization. 

If you register to watch the webinars, you have access to download the presentation files.

Link to the teaching webinar:   https://info.regoconsulting.com/agile-capitalization-october-2022 

Link to the customer success webinar:  https://info.regoconsulting.com/agile-capitalization