Best way to setup projects for a Saas company

[larissa]

Hi everyone, looking for recommendations for best practices for setting up Jira for a Saas company that does customer onboarding. As well as managing feature development and being able to see features that affect delivery for clients. The way it is currently set up is each project is a team. And then each team performs their own sprint planning etc. Snr management would like to see all of the customer onboarding timelines against feature development and would like to be able to plan resources better. I am looking at setting up Jira Advanced Roadmaps. Would it be better to switch to projects being client-based rather than team-based? And then create teams? I'm pretty much a beginner when it comes to the administration of Jira. So links to videos with some suggestions would be very much appreciated. TIA

[Eric Powell]

Hey Larissa, 

Your company does "customer onboarding" for another entity, correct? If no, provide more details. 

1. Snr Mgmt wants to see: [Customer Onboarding Timelines] against [Feature Devs] = Plan resources better. You need to expand on what you mean by "Customer Onboarding Timelines". What does that mean in more detail. 

2. "Would it be better to switch to projects being client-based rather than team-based?"  This depends on your team's ability to handle one or more projects. If one client's project requires several epics ~ 2 weeks, then a 1:1 project to team ratio would probably be best. Thus, client-based.

If a client's project can be completed within a single epic with minimal sprints, then consider it team based. Where a team can handle multiple clients at once. These qualitative questions should be answered by the Agile methodology that your organization is using Scrum, SaFE, etc. 

[Karyna Tyrnavska _SaaSJet]

Hi, @larissa 

Check out Business Process Manager add-on. My team has developed it to streamline business processes, especially, onboarding. You can use the built-in templates or create a customized one that meets your needs.

Try it for free!

[PrentProton]

My team struggled with the same problem while planning our setup and also thinking about marketing later down the line. For SEO strategy as a SaaS brand, I found this guide helpful: https://networthprosper.com/a-guide-to-enterprise-seo-strategy-for-saas-brands/. It gave me a better way to think about how our workflow affects visibility and how content and tech teams can stay aligned. Maybe worth a skim if you're juggling both sides.

[Gracjan Wesołowski _HeroCoders_]

Hi @larissa 

Welcome to the community!

If you are interested in third-party addons, I can recommend our Portfolio app.

We have created this app specifically to easily monitor all projects, their statuses, and dependencies in a single view.

With built-in capacity planning, you can effectively allocate resources and ensure that projects stay aligned with business objectives:

If you are interested, you can book a demo here.

Best Regards.

Gracjan

[Анна Морозова]

I agree—structuring Jira projects to align with your SaaS workflows is crucial for smooth collaboration and delivery. It helps to separate cross-functional work and maintain clarity across teams. Bringing in effective communication between developers, QA, and product managers can make all the difference in reducing bottlenecks.

From the perspective of saas application developers, it’s also valuable to follow a well-defined development lifecycle—from prototyping and MVP to scaling and maintenance. Here's a practical, step-by-step guide that outlines best practices across these stages: saas application developers.

Let me know if you'd like a version tailored more specifically to product teams, devops pipelines, or another focus area!

[scale vista]

Hey Great question! Since management wants visibility across onboarding + feature delivery, keeping projects team-based is usually cleaner. You can then use Jira Advanced Roadmaps (or even dashboards/boards) to roll up timelines, dependencies, and resourcing. Client-based projects often get messy fast. Instead, create Epics or Components for clients so you can still track delivery per customer without losing the team setup.