Is Jira a real project Management tool (for planning and control)

[Doron Raiman]

Hi All,

I'm an experienced project manager and I'm making my first steps with Jira.
I noticed that this system is very helpful in areas like: team collaboration, bug tracking and version management.

What I am missing is a way to control the project from a more high level position, for example I need to be able to see clearly:

1. Version release accumulated delay (If the version is delayed more other than remembering the "original" release date I can see a trend based on history)

2. Estimated finish date of the scope currently in Jira (issues opened)

3. Dependencies between projects and delays (Feature development delays a test task in other project)

4. Creating buffer and tracking if the project is consuming it and how much of it

In one sentence what I'm missing is CONTROL. Currently I can know which engineer is working on what issues, but now more than that.
It is expected of me manage the risks of the project and to estimate the finish date of the agreed scope, I feel that currently I cannot really fulfill these expectations?

I would really appreciate any help from you guys; I really need guidance here.

Doron

[Marcin Geb _SoftwarePlant_]

Compared to 2012, you now have a few mature solutions if 'High-level overview' and 'Control' is your priority. One of them is BigPicture, that didn't even exist back then.

Most of your goals, e.g., release accumulated delay (baselines, see fig. 2), estimated finish date, dependencies between projects, could be done with BigPicture's Gantt chart module. If 'Gantt chart' sounds non-softwareish to you, starting BigPicture 8 you have the option to rename modules (Roadmap?).

Other than the Gantt chart BP has agile Roadmaps, Boards (with dependencies), Scope, Teams, Overview, Resources, Reports, and Risks modules. The app is configurable, so you can build Versions into your work breakdown structure.

Fig. 1 Gantt chart with 'Iterations' enabled

Fig. 2 Baselines (delays)

Fig. 3 Overview module

Fig. 4 Risks

[Renjith Pillai]

Some inputs from your side.

1 & 2. Greenhopper plugin clearly states the trend of the project and can predict the estimated completion time (based on story points and based on

3. Dependencies between projects (to be precise, between issues) are only achieved via links in Jira. But there are no strict rules for the same. It is just an indicator for the users and PM to understand how things are related

4. Time tracking is builtin to Jira with work logging and reporting based on Time tracking reports for the projects.

[Alexander Küken]

Dear Doron,

JIRA offers a lot of features to support your requirements (e.g. the work logging functions). Important is just a good configuration, that fits your needs. Very helpful is the GreenHopper Plugin from Atlassian in order to support version hierarchies. I use this a lot for planning.

Another success factor for project management with JIRA, from my point of view, is visualization. JIRA contains all kind of informations you need for tracking and controlling projects. But it is not always easy to identify problems, based on this informations. Plugins like the Jira Gantt-Chart plugin (https://plugins.atlassian.com/plugin/details/28997) are very helpful in this context.

Cheers,

Alexander

[Jacques]

Real project management is not built in to jira by default. There are however loads of plugins that can be installed (either free or license fee) that can be found here:

https://plugins.atlassian.com/search/category/20987

One of the plugins I think is interesting is the JIRA Gantt Chart Project plugin: https://plugins.atlassian.com/plugin/details/41404 (be careful though, it mentions that it's free but it's not).

Hope this helps,
Jacques.

[Doron Raiman]

Hi Jacques.

Thank you for your reply, I went over these plugins including the one you suggested (I also saw the demo video) - these are all nice - what they basically do is give you graphic view of the data in Jira.
The other "upgrade" I thought of was a tool called "The Connector" which is not a Jira plugin, rather a MS Project plugin that transfers the data from and to Jira and let you control the project in MS Project environment.
Do you have any knowledge or experience with this tool?

Thanks,

Doron