Set up for an ART with multiple Agile Teams

[Muk]

Hello,

I am dealing with a requirement of setting up an Agile Release Train with multiple Agile Teams. The requirement is

1. Single backlog of Features

2. Each of the features will have stories which may get assigned to different Agile Teams. Each team to have their own backlog of stories and tasks based on which the teams to pick up stories/tasks from their respective backlog and assign to their respective sprint.

3. There needs to be different boards to be set up e.g. feature board which is for stakeholders and also for all the teams, story boards per team, sprint boards for respective teams.

4. Should we create separate projects or a single project?

thanks in advance

[Mukesh Adwani]

I have been going through various trainings on Jira admin e.g. Jira basic and advanced administrator from LinkedIn, read the Jira admin strategy guide, gone through Jira Advanced Roadmap training from Atlassian Academy , still I feel none of these training covers indepth training on how to manage issues, workflows and projects in Jira for Scaled Agile with multiple Agile Teams. Any guide you can suggest @Bill 

regards

M

[Danut M _StonikByte_]

Hi @Muk,

My advice is to have a project in Jira for each product that is delivered and to use a field (like Component or a custom field like Team) for assigning items to each team. Each team should have its own agile board, based on a filter that returns the issues assigned to that team. This way, each team will have its own backlog.

For a backlog of features you can create a separated board, that includes only Features. This board can be used by POs to prioritize features and to assign them to teams.  

The sprints should be aligned (in term of start date and duration) across the teams. 

From project tracking perspective, please take a look on this article from our blog:

How to track multi-team or scaled-agile projects (such as SAFe®) in Jira with Great Gadgets app  

As you will see, with our Great Gadgets app you can easily track the progress of every team, as well as the progress at the global release level.

This is just an example of ART burndown chart.

I hope this helps. 

Thank you,

Danut Manda 

[Muk]

Thanks a lot for your response!

Great gadget app looks amazing but we do not have budget for the app.

regards

Muk

[Bill Sheboy]

Hi @Muk 

As you appear to be using the Jira Cloud, Premium license level, there are several ways to implement what you describe:

• Use Advanced Roadmaps, and one (or several) Jira projects
• Use Jira Product Discovery (JPD), to manage ideation to delivery, and associate the Idea issues with delivery items (epics, stories, etc.) in one (or several) Jira projects
• Use one (or several) Jira company-managed projects, and using saved filters for boards, create the structure you need to manage the work and make progress visible
• There are also other Atlassian Marketplace work management tools, specifically targeting such cross-team work, although they may not be needed for your scenario

I encourage you to pause and consider what type of visibility / reporting you need (and why you need it), how you expect the teams will interact / share work, and your desired level of supporting the teams' Jira usage (i.e., your, and other Site Admins, work to help teams).

Then review the capabilities of the above noted tools (Advanced Roadmaps, Jira Product Discovery, and company-managed projects) to consider which would be a better fit to try first.

Kind regards,
Bill

[Muk]

Thanks Bill for your response!

I am planning to use Jira company-managed projects. Will you be able to provide me with more details on how to set it up for 

1. Single backlog of Features

2. Each of the features will have stories which may get assigned to different Agile Teams. Each team to have their own backlog of stories and tasks based on which the teams to pick up stories/tasks from their respective backlog and assign to their respective sprint.

3. There needs to be different boards to be set up e.g. feature board which is for stakeholders and also for all the teams, story boards per team, sprint boards for respective teams.

4. Should we create separate projects or a single project?

5. Also would like to use Jira Plan to view everything in one place

Rgards

M

[Bill Sheboy]

For your scenario, it is all about the saved filters and how you will identify the different teams.  You may use either a single project or multiple...to try this with one project consider this approach:

Some customers use the Component field to identify the teams, which makes it easy to create saved filters for each teams' backlog and board.  The team filters would also limit the issue types shown.  And your Feature level board would be the same.

I recommend pausing to identify the teams, the issue types used by each, and then add the Components and filters to try this.

For example, the Feature board filter could be:

project = yourProjectName AND issueType = Feature ORDER BY Rank ASC

And one for a team would be:

project = yourProjectName AND issueType != Feature AND Component = "Team One" ORDER BY Rank ASC

Please look here to learn more about configuring such boards:

https://support.atlassian.com/jira-software-cloud/docs/configure-a-company-managed-board/

[Muk]

Thanks again for your response!

I have been thinking along the same line. The only thing is I am configuring a custom fields for "Team name".

can I create multiple team level backlog of stories and can I have multiple multiple sprints one per each team under one project?

regards

M

[Bill Sheboy]

Yes, for a company-managed project.  Each board (based on the filter) will have their own backlog view and sprints.  Please note that the board filters are mutually exclusive for each team, as needed.

For example, you note using a custom field for the "Team name", and so each teams' board filter would only reference their name.