Who's who in your Jira Software implementation?

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It's no secret that for a large-scale software implementation to be a success, it involves many individuals (often times from several different business units!) working towards a commonly understood goal. In this article, we have tried to highlight some of the key players we see in successful Jira Software implementations. That being said, there is no one-size fits all answer (and some of the roles mentioned below might even be the same person).

• Scrum masters: These are the folks acting as project leaders in agile teams who focus on optimizing performance of the scrum process. The scrum master is tasked with coordinating many of the inputs and outputs required for an agile program. He or she drives the sprint kickoff, daily stand-ups, sprint review, and sprint retrospective. The scrum master also serves as an agile coach, helping the team to adopt and own agile practices throughout the product life cycle: story point estimation, sprint planning, and continuous delivery. Scrum masters often have project admin access in Jira, which allows them to configure projects to support the way individual teams work
• Development Manager: While the scrum master drives the agile program, the development manager is still an essential stakeholder in the long-term success of Jira. In most cases, they (in tandem with the senior developers) set the development culture. They’re often influential in the technology choice for the program, and continue to own responsibility for the quality of the product from the code architecture to the end-user experience. Because of this, they should have a seat at the table when deciding upon custom fields and workflows within Jira.
• System Administrator: This person knows the ins and outs of your technical architecture, and often is an IT organization. They will be an important person to consult with when determining your hardware needs based on factors such as expected growth, load, and use cases. The system administrator can use resources like the Jira Sizing Guide to help plan a successful implementation. 
  
• Technical Contact: This is role configured in my.atlassian.com, and designates a technical owner of a particular Jira instance. Because of this, we funnel most of our technical tips, Atlassian announcements, information about releases, security advisories, and other important product information directly to this person. Technical contacts have access to license and SEN information at my.atlassian.com.
• Billing Contact: As the name might indicate, this is the person who has access to pay for software maintenance. It could be a manager, someone in your finance department, etc. It's important that this person understands Jira is an essential tool for your org (either themselves or with the help of one of the roles above), as they'll ultimately be responsible to pay for maintenance when the renewal is due. Billing contacts are configured in my.atlassian.com, and have access to see quotes and invoices there. 
  
• Atlassian Resources: If you find that you have gaps roles like these, or you want some additional consulting regarding best practices and setup during your implementation, there are resources available through Atlassian who can help. A Technical Account Manager (TAM) might be a good fit. Particularly helpful with larger deployments, TAMs can help you corral your internal stakeholders in order to maximize your investment in Atlassian.

And let us not forget the actual individual playing the role of Jira Software Admin. This person could be any (or a combination) of the folks listed above. This person is actually responsible for adjusting or creating workflows, adding custom fields, laying out user groups/project roles, etc. Some organizations have designated Jira admins, others might have that role overlaps with their system admin, technical contact, or scrum master.

Comment below with some of the key ingredients (or colleagues) that make up your recipe for Jira Software success.