We're updating our terminology in Jira

'Issue' is changing to 'work item'. You might notice some inconsistencies while this big change takes place.

Use Jira Work Management for project management

The project management project template offers a simple workflow, that allows you to start work on a task, and keep working in it until it's complete.

The workflow has three steps: To do, In progress, and Done.

Workflow with to do, in progress, and done statuses.

About the project management template

  • Ideal for small and large projects or short-term programs of work

  • Suits personal projects and activities

  • Can be used for ad hoc and 'business as usual' activities where you need to see what is currently 'in progress'

Keep things moving

Use the business projects board to quickly view the status of your work items and determine what needs to come next. You can re-order things in the To do column so that your team picks up the most important things. See Working with boards.

Subtasks on business boards

Business boards like this one don't show subtasks on the board itself. Open each work item to view its subtasks. For a more flexible board, check out Jira Software's kanban board.

 

Add project milestones using versions

Projects often have 'checkpoints' or milestones that need to be reached in order to keep the broader project on track. In business projects you can use versions as milestones. Once you have set up version, you can organise work into different versions. See Managing versions.

Reporting

Projects are usually made up of well-defined, specific, measurable activities that have one major deliverable or goal. This makes project reporting even more critical to ensuring things get delivered on time. business projects includes built in reporting, but you also use your dashboard, and custom filters based on your searches to monitor activities.

You can use labels to sort work items into groups and find them easily in search. On a work item, find the Labels field and start typing to create or select a label.

Customize work items

The table below shows the specifications for default work items in a project management project. If you're a business projects admin, you can customize these defaults. For example, you can add other work types to the project, or add new fields to this work type. See Configuring work items.

Work types

Task and subtask

Work item fields

Summary, Work type, Reporter, Attachment, Due Date, Original Estimate, Remaining Estimate, Description, Assignee, Priority, Resolution and Labels

Resolutions

Done, Won't Do, Duplicate and Cannot Reproduce

Priorities

Highest, High, Medium, Low and Lowest

Example of a project management project for an IT team

Scenario

Head office is moving buildings in two months. You need to manage the movement of all IT equipment and prepare the new office infrastructure.

Work item lifecycle

  1. Create a work item for moving the boardroom AV equipment.

  2. Include pictures of the old site and the new site.

  3. Add subtasks for asset count (before and after the move), packing and unpacking.

  4. When work commences, move the work item to In progress.

  5. Complete all the subtasks, including one to reconcile the assets at the new site.

  6. Move work item to Done.

Key actions

  • Use subtasks to make sure the detailed activities get completed

  • Set a due date for work items that are time-dependent

  • Attach pictures and documents that will help the assignee complete the activity

  • Set a priority so that the assignee knows how urgent it is

 

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