Special feature
In this special feature, ZDNet helps enterprises and SMBs alike navigate the technical and management challenges of a remote workforce.
Atlassian is broadening Jira’s reach beyond technology teams to counterparts in functions like marketing, human resources, and finance with the launch of Jira Work Management.
With the move Atlassian, the company is taking its collaboration platform for developers and enabling them to connect with other stakeholders. Atlassian outlined Jira Work Management at its virtual Team ’21 conference.
It has been a busy few weeks for Atlassian as it preannounced strong earnings, acquired ThinkTilt and Chartio and launched Atlassian Cloud Enterprise.
Jira Work Management is the business side of Jira Software and Jira Service Management, which is a team management tool for IT and operations teams. Jira Work Management includes shared and structured workflows, privacy controls and automation of tasks.
Also: How Atlassian sees remote work as a two-fold opportunity
However, Jira Work Management has different views for business users. The views include the following:
- List, which has a spreadsheet-ish UI, puts summaries, tasks, status, assignees, due date, and priorities for easy scanning.
- Calendar, which puts context around work and makes it easier to plan deadlines.
- Timeline, a spin on the Gantt chart and includes data on assignees and status.
- Board, which displays work tasks in a progression.
- Forms, a coordination tool to manage projects with cross-team input.
Atlassian is also adding a series of business project templates in Jira Work Management for use cases. The templates include industry-specific workflows, configurations, and custom fields.
The company added that it uses business language within Jira Work Management. For instance, terms like code, components, and releases are replaced with views, forms, and more business language.
Atlassian also has unlimited automation within projects with pre-made rules as well as custom settings.
Cross-team collaboration
What Atlassian is really going for is an expansion of its team management reach. Jira Work Management shares the same architecture as Jira Software and Jira Service Management so there’s a view into how work fits in with broader initiatives.
Enterprises are likely to be interested in Jira Work Management given software and service development applies to every business function. There’s also an argument that Jira across the enterprise can bolster teams with common language, automation, roadmaps, and a common data layer.
The win for Atlassian is obvious in that it can expand its total addressable market. Companies will be able to break down a few silos within workflows.
Atlassian said that it will continue to update Jira Work Management with a short-term roadmap that includes advances for work views, analytics, and native approvals.
Current Jira customers can access Jira Work Management for free and all Jira business projects across cloud products have been migrated to the Jira Work Management experience.
