How do I remove myself from a project

[Claudiu Creanga]

I was added to a project by mistake (along with other 5k people). Now I'm getting a whole lot of notifications that I don't want. + a lot of people commenting that they want to be removed.

The admin of the project is on holiday now. How can I remove myself from the project?

[Andy Heinzer · Accepted solution]

Hi everyone,

Currently managing which users are involved on a project is something that is expected only to be managed by a Jira Administrator.  An end user that is not an admin, simply does not have the permissions needed to completely remove themselves from a project.  But I can see how this would be a useful thing to have in some situations.  To that end I created a suggestion for this in Jira Cloud in JRACLOUD-75105 and for Jira Server/Data Center in JRASERVER-71544.  Please see our Implementation of New Features Policy for more details about how we prioritize different requests.  

This request is significantly different from a GDPR request that seeks to completely remove a user from a site.  Atlassian Cloud does comply with GDPR requirements as outlined in Atlassian's GDPR Commitment.  And there are steps users can follow in Delete your account to completely remove their Atlassian accounts if they choose to.  However I think that is taking this a bit further than most users want to go here.  Simply seeking to remove yourself from a single project seems like a reasonable ask.  Unfortunately Jira does not currently allow all users the ability to manage this directly. 

In the meantime, it might be possible for you to change issues assigned to you in that project (either assign them to another user, or unassigned if settings permit).  This can sometimes help to reduce your involvement in a project, but there are other ways in which your account might be involved in a project and getting notifications here. End users do not have control over project settings such as component lead, project lead, assignable users, and notification schemes in use for that project.  Because of this, Jira administrators bare the responsibility for configuring projects in their Jira site.

Please reach out to a Jira administrator on your site and ask them to remove your account from the project roles/groups involved in that project.

Andy

[Werner van Aswegen]

Here's a scenario for you Nic.

I am a contract worker. I was added to a Jira project by my client.

For some reason the relationship between the client and myself has deteriorated and I no longer wish to be part of the project neither do I wish to communicate with them any further. Imagine I was doing work for them but they stiffed me when time came to pay me for my services and all attempts to resolve the situation have come to naught.

I should be able to leave such a project. Any items assigned to me should just become unassigned. It should not affect the history of said items.

It's not an uncommon scenario.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Eh?  It's their data, not yours.  It's up to them to reassign issues if you leave.  And I would need to retain the detail of who did what, so although I'd disable your account, there's no chance I'd remove it.

[Alex McConnell]

I agree that they should totally keep the data, and it should not unassign stories, but I should still be able to leave. They can keep their virtual association with my account all they want so long as I don't have to keep getting their email spam or see their projects on my lists of projects.

[jorisw]

Simply, let users leave, but leave (part of) their name on the issues, comments, etc, with a link to reassign them to someone else. No data lost, everybody wins.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

So, allow people to disable their own accounts?

[jorisw]

Have them keep their global Atlassian / JIRA accounts but terminate their active project membership as they please. Implement some way for the project owner not to lose critical historical data because of it.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Jira already does all of that, but only project admins can "remove" people from the project. 

[jorisw]

Then the only argument left not to let users do that themselves, is one that I don't think Atlassian should take the position of making.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

They listened to their users who do not want people arbitrarily removing themselves from a project. 

If I were a project owner and you removed yourself without asking me, I'd add you back and then look at how my organisation handles disciplinary procedures for misconduct. 

[jorisw]

Exactly, a problem that isn't Atlassian's to prevent from happening, from my perspective as a freelance project member.

If I were able to remove myself from the project that I wanted to leave today, I wouldn't have any of the problems you're describing.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

I think you need to try reading my point properly, instead of ignoring it.

[jorisw]

I think you made two separate points, of which I addressed the latter.

If you mean to say I ignored the part about project owners not wanting users to remove themselves, yes, I understand that. Then again we're in a thread in which users are expressing the desire to do so. I'm not sure how you personally are the one to disqualify that desire.

Your part about discipline and misconduct, sounds like a top down authoritarian business culture that doesn't apply where I live or work.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

You have not addressed anything, just kept repeating that you'd like to do something that would solve no real problems and directly cause problems if done in a lot of places this software is used.

I'm not disqualifying anything, just pointing out why it is a bad idea.

[Deleted user]

I have no idea why this is controversial.  @jorisw makes an absolutely cogent point - I have found this annoying and heard of others who have too.

It is only a bad idea insofar as it (may be) difficult to implement.  As a paying user that isn't really my concern, if Atlassian can't manage to do this I will happily take my business to somewhere that can.

[Sutripta Roy]

Users should have option to remove themselves from a project. There should be a option to leave.

[Alex McConnell]

@Nic Brough -Adaptavist- Solve no real problems? You don't consider the fact that my email is getting flooded with spam from a project I haven't been on for a year to be a real problem?

And what faith that the project lead has? If I were still on the project, I wouldn't want to be removed from it, obviously. That would make it pretty difficult to do my job. The problem is when the project lead hasn't done their bloody job and removed me because I haven't made it enough of a pain point for them to prioritize it over whatever else they might have to do. And how could removing myself from a project ever cause anyone any real problems at all? It's forcing us to go through someone else to stop our email from being spammed that solves no real problems.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

No, all that makes a lot of sense.  I would not want to be flooded by emails from a project that I have left.

But.  When that happens, it tells me that I have failed to explain why I should no longer be involved with it.

So.  To try to answer the questions you have:

>You don't consider the fact that my email is getting flooded with spam from a project I haven't been on for a year to be a real problem?

No.  Why have you not told the project owner that you no longer want the emails?

>And what faith that the project lead has? If I were still on the project, I wouldn't want to be removed from it, obviously. That would make it pretty difficult to do my job. The problem is when the project lead hasn't done their bloody job and removed me because I haven't made it enough of a pain point for them to prioritize it over whatever else they might have to do. And how could removing myself from a project ever cause anyone any real problems at all? It's forcing us to go through someone else to stop our email from being spammed that solves no real problems.

Right, so that is a complete mess of a paragraph which essentially tells me that you do not know what you want. 

Or, that you do know what you want, but have not explained it in a way we can talk about.

[Steven F Behnke]

There's no way to do this without communicating with the project owner. Regardless of what you're asking for, the feature doesn't exist. Nic is correct - The answer is speak with the project owner.

[Alex McConnell]

@Nic Brough -Adaptavist- 

> Why have you not told the project owner that you no longer want the emails?

Why do you assume that I haven't? My entire point is that sometimes other people don't do their jobs properly. I should not be punished for someone else failing to do their job properly.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Neither should you be doing something yourself when someone else isn't doing their job.

[Alex McConnell]

There is no way to give me the power to make other people do their jobs, but I could certainly be given the power to leave a project on my own.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

But that would be illegal in many places, as discussed before.

[Prokopiev Yury]

I have the same problem. I worked under a contract and was not paid. I do not want to communicate with anyone on the part of this employer. Why can't I leave the project? Why should I communicate with someone?
Am I correct that the only solution is to leave this rotten Bitbucket account?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

You will need someone who is admin of the project to remove you. 

Project admins can, assuming it's done by role, system and Jira admins can always edit users.

[Claudiu Creanga]

why can't I remove myself from the project? I am the user and I should be the one who choses in which projects I want to be. 

We are now 5k users in a project spamming everyone and we have to wait for an admin to come back from holiday... On top of that there are 100 comments/h from users asking to be removed so that's over 100 email notifications.

What is the logic behind not allowing people to leave projects?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Correct, admins need to look after this.

What happens if you have stuff assigned to you and/or people need to assign to you and you "leave" on a whim?  It breaks the process.

The logic is that your admins need to look after that.

Where is the back-up admin for the project/system?

[Claudiu Creanga]

Well, if I leave then I leave. And it means that I don't do stuff that are assigned to me in that project. The admins will then assign it to someone else. 

What is the benefit of having me there if I'm not doing what's assigned to me anyway because I consider that I'm no longer in the project?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

And what happens when it's still your responsibility?  Arbitrarily deciding it's not your problem is not your job, it's your administrator's job.

It's irrelevant whether you think you're not part of the project, that is up to the owners of the project.

[Claudiu Creanga]

Nope, what I work on is my decision after speaking with my manager. The jira administrator has little say in that. He can just take notice that I left. 

Anyway, solved the issue by blocking all jira emails in outlook. nobody needs that crap anyway. 

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

I'm sorry, I think you're missing the point here - yes, that's a discussion with your manager, and something they pass on to the admin when it's the right time.

It is not up to you to arbitrarily remove yourself.

Seriously though, where are your back-up admins?  If you don't have more than one admin, you have a broken setup.  

[Iulius L]

@Nic Brough -Adaptavist-  
Don't we all have the right to get off a relationship when things go wrong? 
Yes, we do! 

And let me put in EU GDPR law context:

If I want to delete my account, and eventually delete all the data associated with an account,
I have the right to do so and to request confirmation.

I might be a participant in a project, not an employee. 

Your explanation that 
"a discussion with your manager, and something they pass on to the admin"
is, - to say the least - of a hurtful ignorance.

I don't have "a manager".  
There is a Project Manager, not my manager. 
And he is also the admin on JIRA.

He is not my employer or my boss. 

Nobody gave him the Power in The World to hold me hostage as a participant in a project  or to hold my data to his/hers discretion.

If I want to delete my account and/or data he/she has nothing to say
if no other way specified in a  binding contract between me and the organisation he/she represents. 
End of story.

Therefore. 

I HEREBY REQUEST YOUR BUSINESS 

to be identified by 
offering web services by the web address 
https://www.atlassian.com/software
and assistance by
https://community.atlassian.com

ALLOWING ME TO CHOOSE DELETING MY DATA 

AND OPTING OUT / REMOVING FROM A PROJECT 

BY OFFERING ME THE OPTION TO DO SO 

ACCORDING TO MY WILL. 

IN CONFORMANCE TO GDPR EU LAW! 

Thank you!

Request and complaint printed as such.

02-08-2019  23.46 UTC+2

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

First, you've completely missed the point of the conversation, and secondly, if you think something needs doing under GDPR, you need to consult with the people you agreed terms and conditions with when you signed up and they let you in to use their system.  That is not directly Atlassian, as they host the system for someone and it's that someone who owns the data.  And it's got nothing to do with me, unless it's one of the Cloud systems I am at least an admin of (and even then, I'm not the data owner, barring one)

[Alex McConnell]

Sorry, but no. My account is with Atlassian. Here I am, right now, posting on Atlassian forums with my account. This is an Atlassian account. In this account, I can see Jira settings for two former companies I have worked with. I should be able to, in my account, end my link with those companies, at least from the point of view of this account. They should totally be able to keep the data they have that is linked to me, but that doesn't mean that I need to ever see anything about it ever again. It's just like if you delete an account on a site that disables it instead of deletes it. They still have their data, but I don't have to deal with it.

[jorisw]

If you want to exercise your right to erasure as part of the GDPR, Atlassian's support pages mention doing so, though it means deleting your entire Atlassian account accross their services: https://confluence.atlassian.com/jirasoftwarecloud/managing-your-user-profile-764478256.html

I agree with the users in this thread and think Nic is actually the one missing the point. Users should be able to leave whatever projects they want, regardless of Atlassian's design or philosophy regarding project work and collaboration. If there are technical complications as a result of this, it's up to Atlassian to design and implement whatever is needed to deal with that. For instance, (part of) the user's name could still be listed on any remaining tickets, but membership of the project could still be terminated.

As a freelance contractor, I don't have managers to speak to, other than my clients. If I wish to no longer be part of a project, for instance because it's been handed over to others, I should not have to depend on the availability of a project manager to relieve myself of notifications regarding the project.

As an aside, I've found it crazy complicated, if not impossible, to turn off email notifications for a JIRA project, which is how I ended up at this discussion page.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

<sigh> There is no data loss when a person is removed from a project or disabled.  As you've missed that, I assume you've not read the rest of the conversation properly and hence have missed the most important point.

[Mateusz Gorczyca]

<sigh> So how Can I remove myself from a dead project? I like to keep it tidy and it hurts my eyes that I need to see a project that was finished two years ago or couple that I was added by mistake.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

<sigh> Many times, because you have no idea.

Ask your admins to do their job, as we've said many, many, many times before.

[jorisw]

Such professionalism, Nic. Perhaps you should clarify whether you work for Atlassian if you're going to insult users.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

I do not work for Atlassian

I have not "insulted" anyone.  I have pointed out faulty thinking, which is not something I think of as an "insult".  If you take it as an insult, then I am sorry that you see it as such, but I will also be very happy to talk about why I can show that it is wrong.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

No, for the reasons given above.

If it's any consolation, Atlassian are moving in completely the opposite direction - the market actually wants to derive whether you're part of a project from what work you have.  No more people allocating you to things and you needing them to remove you (and them saying no because you should not be removed).  You'll be added to stuff when you're part of it, and effectively removed when you're not.

[Tony.Kerz]

i haven't used jira in a while at my company, but switched roles and am now using jira again.

i went to my project list and saw a bunch of old-abandoned projects.

i then googled something like "jira remove from project", came across this thread, and read thru.

i'm not getting spammed with email cause the projects are dead, but if the projects were still alive and i just no longer worked on them, i would be irritated if i was getting spammed with emails irrelevant to me.

i get the part about data retention and project ownership/admin, and that makes sense from that end, but i still think that users should be able to do something about their view of the world in the form of preferences at least.

for instance:

- show/hide projects

- opt-out of project emails

does that approach seem reasonable?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

The first one is eminently reasonable, but the only way to implement that would be to get the project owners to remove you from it. 

The opt-out option is the one that is never going to happen, because that's the one that breaks the data rules and ownership.

This really does come back to having your admins look after the systems properly.  They need to remove you from the projects you should not be in (or at least set it up so the project only mails you on the stuff you actually need from it), and for dead/abandoned projects, do the housekeeping properly - putting them into read only (so no more emails because nothing is happening), archiving or deleting as appropriate or even just giving them null notification schemes

[Cyril]

It is possible to leave in org an virtually all other software:

https://docs.github.com/en/github/setting-up-and-managing-your-github-user-account/removing-yourself-from-an-organization

https://spigotdesign.com/leave-organization-asana/

https://2.basecamp-help.com/article/233-leave-an-account

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Because it's wrong.  As you have had explained above and ignored.

[Prokopiev Yury]

@Nic Brough -Adaptavist- 

Could you check my case, just a little above? I CANNOT communicate to the project admin, simply impossible in reality. So my account is corrupted for life?

Your points about security are irrelevant: when user leaves a project, he did not get any additional access, only reduction of access. And the project admin should have an access log, so he will see who left. That is it.

Also, it is not clear, what if I will request to delete my personal information according to the GDPR?

[Jaren Briggs]

So I ended up here because someone in my very large company created an account for me, and I was presented with a list of team from my company to join. I clicked one and now I can see their private project stuff/Kanban board/etc I don't work on this project. You're telling me I'm not allowed to leave? I must contact some random employee/project owner and say, sorry my account was added to your team and I can rummage through all of your stuff (security issue anyone) can you please remove me?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Yes.

It's not a security issue with the service or the way it works, the security issue is with your human who added the wrong person to the wrong place.

In this case, you absolutely should spend the time getting in touch with them, for (one of) two big reasons:

1. They added you in error.  They need to know they've made a mistake (which, exactly as you say, could be a security problem)
2. They added you for a good reason.  They need to know that you weren't expecting it and hence explain to you why you're in

If you removed yourself without asking, you cause one of two problems as per those two reasons

• The admin is making mistakes and won't know about it.  So they'll do it again.  Correct them now, they'll do it less.  Especially if it's a possible security issue - always speak up about those!
• You are not doing what people expect you to because you don't know about it.  Ask why you've been added.

However you got added, removing yourself is absolutely the wrong thing to do.  You need to question why.

[Jaren Briggs]

I guess I should specify, Atlassian showed me all of the products my company purchased and multiple teams using the same product @ start.atlassian.com

• Confluence - Team A
• Jira - Team A
• Conflence - Team C
• Jira - Team D

The product allowed me to specify which team I was on. I clicked one at random and the whole interface changed. Now I'm part of that team, without their knowledge. Also, I can't select any other team. This is the team I'm on now. Because I clicked the wrong button. And the user interface doesn't allow me to undo my own mistake. So, to respond:

the security issue is with your human who added the wrong person to the wrong place.

I'm that human

In this case, you absolutely should spend the time getting in touch with them (myself)

1. They added you in error.  yup
2. They added you for a good reason.  nope

If you removed yourself without asking, you cause one of two problems as per those two reasons

• The admin is making mistakes and won't know about it.  I am a sys admin...for a different team!
• You are not doing what people expect you to because you don't know about it.  Ask why you've been added. Who am I asking? These people don't know me from adam! The aren't a part of my immediate organization, my company has more than 20,000 employees and corporate IT is using the same group license.

However you got added, removing yourself is absolutely the wrong thing to do.  You need to question why. I know why...

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

This reads like you have grasped that removing yourself is the wrong thing to do, unless I'm misunderstanding?

[Jaren Briggs]

I've grasped that 

1. I need to find the administrator to remove me from the project so I can be added to the correct one (once you select a team from the list, you can't select a different one)
2. Atlassian is trying to be helpful by showing me all of the teams my company has, which have setup Jira, Confluence, etc. This is convenient and allows new employees to be spun up quickly. Convenience is the enemy of security. Confluence, Jira, Bitbucket could all be used by a bad actor (internal or external) to gather exploits of software. I'm sorry that's how I think, but I'm from the security community. That's what I'm paid for. An admin should either assign you to a team, or you should join a team by invite only. Just because I have a company badge should not mean I have access to TEAM C's source code and TEAM D's bug list.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

Ok, that's great.  I'm completely with you on the security, and I am not fond of Atlassian's default "everyone can see everything" approach (even just splitting it into two groups would solve 95% of the problem)

The next thing I would do is talk to your Atlassian administrators about setting up the systems so that people are not inadvertently added to (or removed from) the wrong projects and spaces.

[Phasma Felis]

I went to sign up for a game's Jira board to submit a bug request, and accidentally selected my corporate email account from LastPass instead of my personal. My bad, I'll just leave the project and move on.

15 minutes of increasingly frustrated googling later, I learn that Jira doesn't allow me to leave a project *that I signed up for*, and this is considered "working as intended" and fixing it "would solve no real problems".

So, here's yet another real problem it would fix. Allowing someone to join a project (as nothing more than a bug reporter!) but not leave it is nonsensical, in Jira or anything else.

It's not necessary to let me remove all record of myself from a project. I just want to not have it lurking in my account forever (especially if the maintainer is out of contact), or have to jump through hoops to do it. There is no reason why that should cause any problems for project maintainers; it fact they'd probably prefer it to being silently ghosted, if they get some sort of notification that I've left.

This is a bug.

[Ruslan_Ishmametov]

Agree. That's absolutely crazy that I can not to remove myself from a project having just assigned by myself. Crazy.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

No, it's absolutely correct that you can't do it.  Please re-read the discussions above.

[Ruslan_Ishmametov]

It is correct due to the 'discusion above' and absolutely incorrect from the point of view real-life logic.

In case I did myself assigned to the project and let's say was not approved by a project admin I should have opportunity to leave. I should be able to do the equal actions by myself.

In other cases I agree with the 'discussion-above-logic'.

In case I assigned by myself and project admin verified me as a team member I can agree that very admin should exclude me. Ok.

In case I was invited to the project. I can not leave. Ok.

In any case thank you the feedback. I found the answer and will contact my admins.