how to move from chaos to scheduled bliss?

[Susan Anglin]

Hi everyone - just starting to think about deploying Atlassian tools in our 30 person IT company, that deploys a customized software solution for clients about once a month. Development is using Waterfall methodology currently.   We are at day one of trying to bring some order to the scheduling chaos.  How should I start?  Are there consultants that can help map the internal processes and help with solution setup and change management?  How have your companies made this journey?

[Erica Moss]

@Susan Anglin Hi, Susan! Welcome to the Community. Are you interested specifically in how Jira can help with this process? If so, I'd be happy to move your question to that product collection, so you can maximize the insights you receive. Thanks!

[Susan Anglin]

Hi Erica - Yes - I'd be interested to know which Atlassian products are most suited to this work.  And yes, how can Jira help?   I am thinking that the Jira software would be the base.  It's a big change from our current - throw the functional design over the wall - process, so I'm wondering how to tackle the challenge.

[Erica Moss]

@Susan Anglin Awesome! Will move the discussion for you. 😄

[carolyn french]

Hi @Susan Anglin and welcome to the Community! Glad to see you here. All of us are in varying states of chaos and schedule bliss. We welcome you to that journey. Lots of good resources here on the community site. If you are looking to adopt agile practices along with the Atlassian tools, you can find good reading material here: https://www.atlassian.com/agile. 

Also, there is a network of Atlassian Partners if you would like to have consultants help your team : https://www.atlassian.com/partners

Best of luck!

Carolyn

[Colin Rogers]

@Susan Anglin 

Hello Susan and a very warm welcome to our community. We are an Atlassian Strategic Partner and more than happy to help you where we can. It would be extremely useful to understand your client scenario in more detail, we can then see how best to help, support and provide advice on options and approach. Happy if you want to reach out to me to discuss further.

[Sonja Athing]

Hi @Susan Anglin 

Your post brings an avalanche of thought to my mind !  Our organization has tackled these issues as well.

Some thoughts to share:

As per Waterfall methodology,  consider now 'Iterative Waterfall'.  Break down work efforts into small chunks, ones that can be iterated and potentially grown.  The team(s) will need to decide what a good 'small chunk' comprises.  Team members across disciplines will need to communicate often and freely, this is really key.

Confluence is a must have for project content and traceability of Jira Issues to Confluence content is easy using links.  Also, don't let your teams get into the habit of using Confluence as a file attachment repo.   Of course this is totally supported, but that's not what its meant for.  Instead,  use it as a wiki --> shared drives, .ppt content, .xls content, .doc content, emails, this can all be done via Confluence wiki.  But the cultural shift may be large.  So, ..., baby steps and patience.

If using git as your code repo,  Bitbucket connects beautifully to Jira and is a gateway to DevOps using Bamboo.

Do also investigate the merits of the Fisheye/Crucible app.  Also integrates w/the apps but, in case you are using svn or mercurial, is an alternative to Bitbucket. 

The Marketplace has many many addons to make the tools even better.

The Atlassian documentation is excellent for admins and users.  Plenty of tutorials to get started with as well. When you have questions or get stumped on a task,  search the community for answers.

Enjoy !

Sonja