How to Utilize Jira Notifications for a Better Workflow

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Staying apprised of what is going on at work is vital, no questions there. Because of this, it's safe to say that getting notifications on the latest updates on your Jira issues is necessary. However, sometimes there's a huge flux of them coming in, which can be overwhelming. Other times, there's a delay in when Jira email notifications come in on an urgent task, which can be problematic. What you need is a more organized system in place that can increase productivity and limit both distractions and tardiness on dealing with tasks. For that, we're going to highlight one of our very helpful tools, In-App & Desktop Notifications for Jira.

Deal with your issues quicker

One thing to keep in mind is that notifications aren't simply reminders of updates, or new activity on your Jira issues. You can do a lot more with them without losing your current workflow. Not only can you view the Jira in questions straight from the notifications, you can also comment on them. Even approve or decline updates on these issues. You can choose to watch an issue, add other watchers to it, or un-watch it if you no longer feel your involvement in that particular task to be necessary. 

Once you're done, you can go back to your work without needing to switch tabs to find the issue in question to view the latest changes.

Customize your Jira notification settings

You don't need to go through the hassle of scouring your email for updates on Jira issues. Your in-app notifications can help you take quick actions without leaving your current page. But even if you're not within the app, you can take things one step further if you enable desktop notifications.

All you'll need to do is configure your Jira notification settings for the app, and customize the way you'd like to receive your notifications.

Organize your Jira notifications

Another thing you can do is organize your task list priorities, by viewing all your notifications in one place and determining which needs to be dealt with first. But how?

Well, with In-App & Desktop Notifications for Jira, you get the option of arranging how you view the Jira notifications coming through. This can be found in the form of three convenient tabs.

My issues tab

This tab helps you find notifications related to you, a task you've been assigned, or a ticket you've personally created, or even when someone mentions you in a comment. If you want to go back to a particular ticket with ease, you can do so with ease from here.

Watched issues tab

This tab helps you find notifications on tickets you're watching. So even if these tickets aren't ones you're personally involved in, but you're still invested in their progress of how they're going, you can view them without mixing them up with your personal tickets you need to deal with.

Pinned tab

This tab will help you find all the notifications you've pinned. Perhaps there was something you couldn't deal with straight away, but needed to keep it close so that you'd remember to work on it. All you'll have to do is pin it, and then view it whenever you have the time.

With the help of these three tabs, you can easily divide how you'd like to view these notifications, which ones need to be dealt with first, and find or search for issues you've personally pinned.

Conclusion

As important as notifications are, they can sometimes be an unwanted distraction, and require you to stop what you're doing to go to the source and deal with whatever updates came through. But what if the update was a simple comment for another user? Or something that doesn't require your immediate attention? You've now lost your train of thought for no reason. So being able to view the update straight away and learn the gist without stopping your work can help you optimize your workflow. You can even leave a quick comment and get back to work.

Don't let your notifications sidetrack you, learn how to make use of them to not only stay on track, but to deal with things at the right time. Whether it's a quick comment now, or a much more thorough look later, that's up for you to decide.

[Mohamad Alhajj - Infosysta]

The best way to eliminate Jira noise in my inbox