Unboxing Epic Sum Up: Easy Epics Management and more

ESU Logo Illustration Hero

Epic Sum Up is a Jira application designed to help Project Managers in DevOps and across the digital landscape better visualise the projects they manage. Epic Sum Up uses progress bars, color coding, and principles of Agile project management to transform an overloaded instance of Jira into a highly visual instant dashboard. 

Project Managers using Epic Sum Up (ESU) with Jira will have the ultimate birds-eye view of what’s going on with large projects, epics and deep-seeded issues. While configuration is essentially automatic, customisation options are also virtually endless, as users can choose which metrics or fields to visualise, where and why.

We’ll be digging into the particular features of Epic Sum Up in this article including the best ways for Project Managers to get the most out of Jira.

Progress Bars with Detail View

One of the premier challenges that Project Managers face is the ability to navigate everything they oversee all at once. As issues become more complex or loaded with updates, Project Managers are spending more time digging through changelogs and comments, looking for anecdotal evidence of progress. 

Quick overviews and templatable layouts put control back in the hands of the Project Manager as they are able to create a dashboard customised to their priorities, effortlessly. With progress bars that offer a robust detailed view, hierarchical issues can expand from any bar. This means that these quick summaries aren’t just fast and lean, but they pack a detailed punch whenever needed. 

Customisable Fields for Greater Control

Epic Sum Up was designed with Agile principles in mind, but Epics aren’t the only type of project that work with Epic Sum Up. In fact, any issue type can be segmented into containers with Epic Sum Up, as Project Managers now have greater control of the hierarchy and organisation of every issue. 

Where customisation might sound like a heavy lift, it’s easiest with Epic Sum Up. Other tools and apps will dictate the approach to Project Management and box-in the way Managers organise data, tasks and other information. With Epic Sum Up, greater flexibility is built in as the tool doesn’t assume what you’d like to see first or most. You, as the Project Manager, are in control of the dashboard and can decide and adjust priorities as and when needed.

What aggregates or metrics are you constantly checking? Which signs of progress (or stagnation) are you looking for when you’re diving into an issue? Bring those up front. Force those into focus. Every issue becomes easier to navigate with a summary tool like Epic Sum Up on your side.

A More Supportive Summary Panel

Project Managers are constantly making micro-decisions as part of their workday. These choices to delegate a task, put a project on hold, or move dates are best motivated by the ability to see everything all at once. 

A high level overview in the Summary Panel will help any Project Manager tie visuals to decision-making triggers and contextualise data that wouldn’t ordinarily be easy to digest. 

Here are just a few examples of what Project Managers can see in a flash with ESU: 

  • See what’s completed, still in progress, or stuck. 
  • View comments and attachments without drilling down or navigating to each individual issue.
  • See a birds-eye of time estimates, logs, and time remaining and apply that view to any issue.
  • Mark budget lines against time progress, billable hours, OKRs, or any custom metric you can identify. 
  • Aggregate issues by status, by assignee, or by any other measure that might group them meaningfully for you.

Epic Sum Up is a Project Manager’s Paradise

Epic Sum Up is a great support for Project Managers because it was designed and developed with Project Management frustrations in mind. The flexibility of fit and customisation is what makes ESU particularly unique, as this application won’t require Project Managers  to reconfigure their process to fit in. Getting started is super easy.

Thanks for reading! Do leave comments, and connect with me on Linkedin if you would like to have a chat about anything related to project management in Jira.

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