Customized Project Management Templates: Improving Team Wellness and Workflow
Customizing templates in project management tools can be of great benefit in streamlining workflows and enhancing communication across diverse teams. When implemented in platforms like Jira, Shortcut, and Monday.com, templates can help standardize processes and ensure team alignment with project objectives and timelines. The effective use of customized templates by Engineering, Quality Assurance (QA), and Project Management (PM) teams to optimize processes for efficient project tracking and execution can be an easy one-day improvement.
Engineering Ticket Templates
Engineering teams benefit from templates that capture detailed information, facilitating smooth workflows and robust communication. Standardized Engineering templates might include:
- • Description: A brief overview of the task and its design specifications, potentially including contextual notes relevant to the task.
- • Implementation Details: A description of the proposed approach, informing the team about utilizing current software solutions or devising new ones.
- • Acceptance Criteria: A list of requirements that must be met for the ticket to be considered complete.
- Alternatively, some teams may prefer to use the "Given-When-Then" format for behavior-driven development, which is widely understood and accepted in the development community.
In addition to format choices, including fields for tracking agile sprints, project phases, and team velocity (points) is often recommended. This structured approach helps engineers understand tasks clearly and align efforts with the project's timeline and broader goals, enabling clear communication of ticket status to PM and QA teams.
QA Ticket Templates
QA teams need templates that emphasize detail and clarity for effectively describing and tracking issues.
A typical QA template might include:
- • Current Result: Description of the observed issue or bug.
- • Expected Result: Description of the desired or expected behavior.
- • Steps to Reproduce: Detailed steps necessary to replicate the issue.
PM Team Epic Templates
PM teams managing larger tasks or epics could also benefit from more standardized templates.
A PM epic template could include:- • Title: The name of the epic.
- • Description: Detailed overview of the epic's purpose in relation to overall project goals.
- • Feature Elements: Bullet points outlining individual elements of the feature, each linked to an associated work ticket.
- • All associated tickets: All tickets associated with the epic should be listed, corresponding to the feature elements outlined.
User stories and design requirements may be included for enhanced visibility, alongside the details of specific employees responsible for these areas. Additional fields for technical considerations, dependencies, risks, broader acceptance criteria, timelines, stakeholders, and links to related tasks or engineering tickets ensure clarity and scope, aiding in understanding epic objectives and roles.
Agreeing on required data for templates in project management tools is crucial for efficient task tracking and streamlined communication. Well-structured templates improve clarity, facilitate deeper collaboration, and uphold high standards in project execution across various platforms, bridging the gap between feature requests and the successful delivery of complex projects.