You do not hate JIRA, you hate your supervisor

It looks like it has turn out to be widespread to hate on JIRA. In reality, an excellent pal of mine despatched me this, which is what triggered this publish:
(when you’re the proprietor of the picture, attain out to me and I will attribute it correctly)

I am often not one to run to the protection of a particular know-how, particularly one I hate. Although, I feel it is essential that folks hate issues for the appropriate purpose. The very fact is, JIRA remains to be merely one of the best device for monitoring custom-made duties with custom-made workflows and with the ability to carry out highly effective searches and reviews in opposition to them. The important thing right here is “custom-made”. There are various platforms that can cost the identical or lower than JIRA and give you a fairly venture workspace with duties – nevertheless it’s often lacking one of many customization or looking out options I discussed above.

The commonest causes I hear for hating on JIRA are:
  – It is too difficult
  – I spend extra time monitoring tickets than doing work

To that I say…

You hate your micro-Supervisor

JIRA is just as difficult as you make it. It comes out of the field with quite simple workflows and only a few fields on the web page. It takes 5 minutes to get going with duties that simply go from Open -> In Progress -> Closed. This isn’t an excessive amount of to ask. Any particular person ought to have the ability to report this a lot data on their process.

For individuals who know JIRA, you may see that this default “workflow” has now been diluted to not implement ANY steps, which makes all the pieces simply stickies on a board.

Should you discover JIRA is just too difficult, it is as a result of whoever set it up created far more steps, screens, and fields than are in all probability obligatory on your work. 

A fast seek for “difficult JIRA workflow” resulted on this image from idalko.com, which seems to be a bunch that helps individuals with their enterprise processes. That is their instance of how NOT to do a workflow.

In case your move is like this, you do not hate JIRA, you hate your supervisor that put this in place. JIRA simply occurs to be an important device for constructing flows like this, however it could actually’t cease individuals from utilizing it incorrectly.

You hate your non-Supervisor

The opposite widespread drawback is a non-Supervisor – a “supervisor” who would not discuss to you and would not know a lot about what you are engaged on. They only wish to verify a dashboard, see all inexperienced lights, report back to their managers that the sunshine is inexperienced, and gather their pay verify.

This kind of supervisor asks for detailed time estimates, 10 steps within the workflow, and each day updates. JIRA is a superb device that may do all of these items, nevertheless it does not imply they need to be carried out. JIRA doesn’t change the necessity for expert managers and staff leads that really know what is going on on.

You hate any supervisor (transparency)

Let’s be trustworthy; it won’t be your supervisor, it could be you. In some initiatives I’ve labored on, no quantity of monitoring is welcomed.

Some individuals wish to be given work, loads of time to do it, and ensure nobody else is aware of tips on how to do their work – lest they get replaced. Earlier than the remote-work-revolution, it was more durable to get changed. Now, fast entry to international expertise makes it a lot simpler to get changed. I assume it is why some individuals have turn out to be extra protecting of their work. 

That is improper, and it is the precise purpose that firms make use of micro managers and non-managers. Most firms simply wish to earn cash, and their builders and managers are variables in a formulation to make that occur. They wish to change you with a less expensive model that may do the identical factor. These are probably not the businesses you wish to work at.

I imagine there’ll at all times be work for expert, arduous employees. The talents it’s worthwhile to have could change, however there’s at all times work to be carried out. Focus your time on honing these expertise and discovering an excellent place to work, fairly than making an attempt to guard your present job by hiding your work.

You Hate Studying

Should you’re the one setting JIRA up, cursing the complexity, it is in all probability since you did not take a time to learn Atlassian’s thorough documentation. You had been hoping JIRA could be a simple button to handle your initiatives. You need the options it affords, however you do not wish to take the time to learn to use the device.

Properly, that is an issue with all the pieces – not simply JIRA. Based mostly on the widespread causes individuals hate JIRA, you need to suppose twice about if you really want this complexity performance – your staff could hate it.

Should you decide you do want this further performance, then take the time to study it or pay somebody who is aware of tips on how to do it already.

Cloud-Pushers

For years, they’ve had a holier-than-thou method to cloud migration. At first of this transfer a few of their greatest prospects had been insisting they wanted to remain on-premise with JIRA Server. Atlassian instructed these prospects that they only “did not perceive the advantages of the cloud but”, and could be given a bit extra time to grasp.

Their prospects pushed again sufficient that Atlassian has dedicated to sustaining an on-premise model – JIRA Information Heart. It is functionally the identical for patrons who beforehand used JIRA Server, however now prospects get the pleasure of spending about 4x the licensing value. It would come as no shock that the Information Heart providing prices about as a lot as their cloud providing. They’re hoping they will drive hold-outs to the cloud, or at the least make more cash off of their “cussed” prospects.

Revenue Protectionists

As we will see from the fee mannequin for shifting to the cloud, Atlassian is kind of targeted on milking extra out of their money cow. The unlucky factor is that JIRA itself has not modified a lot within the final 10 years. Atlassian has regularly elevated the worth of JIRA with out including significant options, whereas widespread characteristic requests have been unanswered for over 12 years. Atlassian isn’t occupied with constructing a brand new higher product; they’re occupied with charging extra for a similar previous factor.

UX Churn

In an try to justify growing prices, they’re consistently altering the UI of their cloud surroundings. This is likely one of the massive ache factors with the cloud. Atlassian strong-armed many purchasers into utilizing the cloud providing, and now incessantly modifications the UI whether or not prospects prefer it or not. This has a severe impression on firms that already wrestle to get their groups to make use of an software they discover “difficult”. 

Nobody has changed them but!

With all my grievances listed above, the factor I hate most is that nobody has changed JIRA but. It has been the identical for the final 10 years, and nobody has made a adequate alternative. Sure, there are numerous subject trackers that allow you to assign duties to individuals and alter a standing – however they do not permit a custom-made workflow that may be enforced. For big-scale groups doing distributed work in a constant manner, that is essential, and it is in all probability why individuals nonetheless use JIRA.