Jira&Gmail for Consulting Teams

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If you manage a consulting team, you've likely encountered multiple emails flooding your inbox. While a significant portion of communication occurs through instant messaging and virtual meetings, emails continue to hold their ground in popularity. Picture the scenario: you start your day by opening your inbox, only to realize you're in for at least an hour or two of navigating through messages. Some of these emails require conversion into Jira tasks, adding complexity to your workflow. The constant toggling between tabs, task creation, and handling attachments—download to your computer, attach to Jira, and so on—further slows your productivity. 

Confronted with this challenge, our team successfully addressed it by creating the Email&Tasks: Jira Cloud for Gmail app, hitting the mark precisely. As of November 2023, the app has garnered over 6,000 users. 

So, how can the Email&Task app help you specifically? Let's take a look.

But, first…

Let's set the record straight on why Jira is necessary for consulting companies.

Jira can be a powerful tool for consulting companies to manage projects, collaborate with clients, and ensure the smooth delivery of consulting services. Jira's flexibility and customization options make it adaptable to a wide range of consulting scenarios. 

Project Planning. Jira helps plan and track projects by creating tasks, assigning them to team members, and setting due dates.

Agile Methodology. Many consulting teams use agile methodologies for project management. Jira's Agile features, like Scrum and Kanban boards, are beneficial for managing tasks in iterative development cycles.

Issue Tracking. Consulting companies can use it to log and monitor client issues, track resolution progress, and maintain a transparent record of problem resolution.

Custom Workflows. Consulting projects often have unique workflows. Jira allows companies to customize workflows to match their specific project processes, ensuring the tool aligns with their business requirements.

Reporting and Analytics. Consulting teams can leverage Jira's reporting and analytics features to gain insights into project progress, team performance, and issue resolution metrics. Customizable dashboards allow teams to visualize data relevant to their projects.

Client Collaboration. Jira enables such teams to collaborate with clients effectively. Clients can be given limited access to Jira to view project progress, provide feedback, and report issues.

Service Desk. Jira Service Desk is an extension of Jira designed explicitly for customer support and service management. Consulting firms can use it to handle client queries, issues, and service requests efficiently. 

Jira provides robust security features and can be configured to meet compliance requirements. This is crucial for consulting companies, especially when dealing with sensitive client information.

Transforming Emails into Jira Issues

Transforming emails into Jira issues ranks among the most frequent tasks. To fulfill this requirement, employing a dependable tool that ensures security in various scenarios is advisable.

Numerous consulting teams have embraced the Email&Tasks: Jira Cloud for Gmail app to address this demand. Let's delve into a concise presentation of its capabilities and how it can be beneficial:

Swiftly convert your emails into Jira tasks:  

1) Automatically leveraging the power of artificial intelligence (AI).

2) Manually.

Utilizing the "Include email content to Description if any" functionality enables you to transfer the complete email content to the issue description. The "Include email Attachments if any" feature seamlessly attaches all email attachments to the respective issue.

3) Schedule a meeting in Google Calendar and immediately set a task in Jira that relates to it simultaneously.

4-7) Edit and comment on tasks. Log time in a Jira issue. In short, stay connected to Jira even when you're in your email inbox.

How about using your mobile phone? When you're always on the go and may not have access to a laptop, or when you urgently need to create a Jira task based on an email. Email&Tasks is up to the challenge – the add-on is accessible for use in the mobile version of Gmail.

Email&Tasks comes equipped with a Chrome browser extension as well

Beyond functioning as your personalized Jira within any browser, the extension is designed to identify tasks within emails. It conveniently showcases task details such as name, type, and status directly on the Gmail start screen without requiring you to open the email. Furthermore, customizable display settings for Jira task types are available in the extension's settings. Install the Chrome Web Store extension, log in with your Jira account, and enjoy the seamless integration!

We await you in the Email&Tasks: Jira Cloud for Gmail team. Here's a 30-day free trial to get to know the app better. The app is free for teams of up to 10 users. 

Happy winter and lightning-fast email transformations in Jira tasks ❄️