Problem
Transparency in both time estimated as well as progress tracking for projects is a basic requirement for all Origo customers. Before implementing Epic Sum Up no budget field was available, therefore no way to compare with the total sum of worked hours.
Also, Origo has over a million Jira issues and was struggling to accurately budget tasks.
During estimation the team lacked the overview of the hours needed for the project and project managers were missing the overview needed to properly manage each project in Jira. Project managers struggled to get a clear overview of estimation/budget for each epic (epic being a project for Origo).
Before using Epic Sum Up the only way to get an overview of the budget and time spent for each project was to get a report from the accounting team every month and pivot logged work per project in an excel file.
Solution Using Epic Sum Up for Jira
Epic Sum Up gives Origo a clear overview of time spent for each task in a project at any given time. No need to look at reports.
This was not possible before implementing Epic Sum Up.
The result is greater accuracy in estimation and success in project budgeting.
When Origo first started using Epic Sum Up they got a lot of red indicators in the progress bar even though all time tracking on the project was correct.
Epic Sum Up is the missing Jira tool to more accurate estimation.
Software Solutions Expert, Origo
Origo project managers are now able to react quicker if the sum of logged work is reaching the budget down to each task/subtask. There is now a stronger awareness as well as more accurate estimation. Better progress tracking was critical to change the way teams documented hours and reduce changes during a project.
Epic Sum Up is the daily management tool that complements reports, which Origo still uses.
The Details
- Current status of the progress is updated automatically
- Comparison with the budget is always visible
- Didn’t require any changes to workflow
- All in real-time
Can see the current status whether in a sub-task or all the way up to the epic level. Origo staff logs hours everywhere.
Summary Panel with Time, Completed Issues and Status Category appears in every epic thanks to Epic Sum Up. They have been critical to the improvement in estimating.
No configuration required. You can start using Epic Sum Up with default values.
Software Solutions Expert, Origo
The time progress custom field from Epic Sum Up has been created and displayed in a Jira dashboard showing the current status of each epic in the portfolio.
This lack of need to drill down has been central to the success. Epic Sum Up shows the real-time data across the epic. This ability to see data without creating reports has been a crucial factor in improving estimates for each task and sub-task. Project managers are keeping projects closer to budget.
Origo Workflow
General structure:
Project → Epic → Task → Sub-task
- all budgeted tasks based on hours (range from 100 to thousands of hours per epic)
- create an epic for every project (multiple epics per large client)
- epic gets approved by owner and a value in budget field set representing total amount of hours
- project manager and team estimate the complexity and time on tasks and sub-tasks linked to the epic
- total sum of estimated hours can not exceed the value in epic budget field
- all the work is logged on tasks and sub-tasks in Jira
Development projects are using a different structure for issue types:
Project → Epics → (Story, Improvements and Bug) → Sub-task
