Creation of Themes above Epics in premium

[Erin Davies]

Hi all, I can see there's an ability to create issues that sit above the Epics in advanced roadmaps (which I've done)

What I'm confused about is the mapping upwards. To create a "theme" ticket type I've had to create it as a "Base" level ticket - can I create is as a second Epic type so it displays like epics or can I only have a single epic type ticket?

How do I ensure correct linking up? I've seen that there are some changes around epic-link and parent-link: What do I need to do with that to ensure the hierarchy of Theme>Epic>Story>Task>Sub-task persists and works?

[Mark Segall]

Hi @Erin Davies and welcome to the community!

When it comes down to it, Epics are special and there's no way to replicate their behavior even with those higher hierarchy issue types like Theme in your case. 

As for linking...

• Below the Epic - Link using Epic Link
• Epic and above - Link using Parent Link

[Erin Davies]

Hi Mark, 

Thanks for replying. Unfortunately this now leaves me with a problem of managing cross-team portfolios using themes. I've tried using Structure for this but it still leaves me without an easily understandable view of the work 

[Mark Segall]

Can you please provide more detail around "a problem of managing cross-team portfolios using themes"?  For example, here are a couple tips for how I manage above the Epic:

1. Issues above the Epic are typically cross-functional so I'll manage them in their own project, providing the following benefits:
   1. Get their own key, making it a bit easier on those linking an epic to them
   2. Can have their own permission scheme enabling more control over who can actually manage those types of issues
2. Use automation to reduce some of the overhead:
   1. Dynamic flagging/transactional commenting - Target End on Epic exceeds Target End on parent issue, flag the parent and set a comment so the program manager has more visibility than the roadmap alone (e.g. Seeing at risk Themes on a dashboard)
   2. When an Epic transitions, automatically transition the parent

These are just some ways that you can make it easier to manage the program level issues.