How do I see all of my teams tasks from different projects on one timeline?

Question

My team was working on Trello before and recently have switched over to Jira as a mandate from our company. We are a videography and design team with several different clients and each client has their own Jira Project where we manage our tasks and track time etc.

As the project manager, I want to know how I can see all of the tasks we have for the different clients in one timeline or Roadmap so I can avoid scheduling conflicts. We get new tasks briefed in daily as well as close tasks daily across all of the projects. This is different to the way a dev team would usually operate.

Is there maybe a more efficient way to track and manage our work? Like having all of our clients in one project?

Could someone maybe suggest how they would use Jira in this situation?

We have experimented with both Work Management Projects and Software Projects to see what the best fit will be but I can't wrap my head around what would be the best solution.

Thanks!

George Mihailoff · Answer

Another option is a Kanban board where items for each customer are grouped in a swimlane. You can set up a board that shows items from multiple Jira projects.

Use labels or a custom field to associate issues with customers and then use it for swimlane setup.

Michał Kowalewski_SolDevelo · Answer

Hi @Kimon Candiotes

This is Michał from SolDevelo company and I'd like to show you an app that our team has created to facilitate task scheduling for the team.

The app allows you to track the progress of your team to see what team members are currently working on and how long it will possibly take to complete the task.

It’s called “Team Planner” and thanks to the app you’re able to create a plan to which you can add your team members, link Jira issues, and add time offs.

I have attached a sample screenshot of our application below:

If you are interested then we are happy to answer any questions. Feel free to contact our support team whenever you need by going to this link.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Kind regards,
Michał
SolDevelo Team

Trudy P Claspill · Answer

Hello @Kimon Candiotes

Are you using the Free, Standard, or Premium plan for Jira? If you see the option for "Plans" in the menu bar then you are on the Premium (or Enterprise) plan.

If you do have that option then you can use the Advanced Roadmaps functionality to create Roadmaps that display information from multiple Software projects. If you are on a lower level plan, the Roadmaps can be for only one project, not multiple projects. Advanced Roadmaps also is not yet available if you are using Team Managed (vs. Company Managed) projects.

The Timeline feature of Work Management projects is also only for a single project at a time.

If you don't have the Premium plan and don't want to upgrade to it, but do want a multiple project roadmap view, there are third party apps that you can integrate with Jira to also give you that functionality. You can find them in the Atlassian Marketplace.

Whether or not you have a separate project for each client or all clients in one project depends on a number of factors related to how you work.

- Do you need to restrict visibility to the issues?

- Do you need to have different permissions for different people depending on the client?

- Do you need to produce client-specific metrics/reports as well as an over-arching timeline for all projects?

- Do you need all client work being processed in a consistent manner (issue types, workflows, custom fields)?

- Does each client/project team need to be able to manage customizations independently of the other client/project teams?

These are questions that will impact your choices about how to set up you use of projects.

It is, unfortunately, not a simple question. I recommend that your organization take some time to consider these points and make a usage plan based on the results.