Can a non-global admin edit work items[screens, resolution, fields] for company managed software

Question

For a company managed software, we want the lead and manager for this software to be able to edit his board resolutions, screens and work item field without granting him a global admin access.

Issues still persist after:

* Adding the person as space and Jira project admin
* upgraded the permission schemes to administer projects, manage issue layouts

Swathi Acharya · Answer

Hello @Nath Adewole

Welcome to Atlassian Community!

Any user with the global permission Administer Jira will be able to edit workflows and schemes.

The project permission "Edit Workflows" allows any non-admin to edit and manage the Workflows, however, if the project uses a scheme shared across multiple projects, then the user must have the Administer Jira permissions.

Thank you!

Hari Krishna · Answer

Hi @Nath Adewole ,

What you’re trying to do is a very common ask, but there are some hard boundaries in Jira that explain why this still isn’t working.

In a company-managed software project, boards, screens, and work item fields are not fully project-scoped. Even though they look like they belong to a project, they are often controlled by shared configurations (board filters, screen schemes, field configuration schemes, and issue type schemes). Because of that, Jira deliberately restricts who can edit them.

Here’s why the actions you already tried didn’t solve it:

Project Admin allows managing project settings, permissions, components, versions, and some board settings, but not shared configurations.

Administer Projects permission only applies to the project itself; it does not grant access to global schemes.

Manage issue layouts applies mainly to team-managed projects and does not override scheme ownership in company-managed projects.

Boards in company-managed projects are tied to saved filters, and editing those filters requires ownership or global permissions.

Because of this, there is no supported way to let someone edit:

Board configuration (columns, swimlanes, resolutions, filters)

Screens

Work item (issue) fields

in a company-managed project without giving them Jira Admin (global) access or ownership of the underlying schemes.

What teams usually do instead is one of the following:

Create project-specific (non-shared) schemes for screens and field configurations, then temporarily grant Jira Admin access to make changes and remove it afterward.

Transfer filter ownership of the board filter to the user so they can edit board settings, while keeping scheme changes handled by a central admin.

Move the project to a team-managed project, where board configuration, fields, and screens are fully project-scoped and editable by Project Admins.

Keep the current model and handle board/screen/field changes through a lightweight admin request process.

In short, this is a product limitation by design, not a permissions misconfiguration. In company-managed projects, Atlassian intentionally protects shared configurations to prevent cross-project impact, which is why global admin access is required for those changes.

Hope this clarifies why the permissions you tried didn’t work and what the realistic options are going forward.

Nikola Perisic · Answer

Yes, Manage workflow permission is separate in your permission scheme and needs to be applied to the needed role.