Team

A team is a closely collaborating group of people, contributing to one or more programs (Agile Release Trains - ARTs).

Only Ativo Programs for Jira administrators can create, edit and delete teams (more info).

Ativo Agile Programs for Jira uses its own team configuration. Jira cloud also has team definitions, but these do not contain the necessary scope information. Sorry 🧡.

You can align with the "Advanced Roadmaps / Plan" team definitions (included in Jira Premium and Data Center) by referring to the the Jira boards or JQLs in Ativo.

Create a new team (based on a Jira board)

To create a new team, using a Jira board:

Open Ativo Programs
Click on Settings and then on Teams
Click on the Create Team button
Select the dedicated Jira board that the team is using. Ativo will use the Jira filter of the board as the scope for the team, as well as the board mode and estimation settings.
Click Create

Supported Jira boards

A Jira board is supported if it:

Has a JQL filter that is supported in Ativo
Is a Scrum or Kanban board
Has an estimation that is either Story Points, Man Days or Issue Count. When using Story Points, all Ativo teams should use the same Jira field. A Jira admin can select the Story Points field to use in Jira via (Jira settings > Apps > Ativo Programs > Fields ). If not selected, the default Jira Story Points field is assumed.

Create a custom team

Create a 'custom team' if the team is not using a dedicated Jira board (e.g. no board exists, or it is shared with multiple teams).

To create a custom team, do the same steps as above when creating a team using a Jira board. When the modal is open, select ''

Open Ativo Programs
Click on Settings and then on Teams
Click on the Create Team button
Fill in the configuration information (see below)
Click Create
Click Submit (on the main team overview page)

Configure a new team:

Team name - used as a label, e.g. on the program board.
Team key - used when importing / exporting data. Choose something meaningful.
Mode - set to Scrum or Kanban. With scrum, a team will plan stories in sprints. With Kanban, the due date field is used instead to map stories to sprints at program level.
Estimation - set to Story Points, Man Days or No estimations, depending on how the team estimates work. Each team can use its own estimation method. Totals at feature and program level will be consolidated with a standard conversion rate of 1 MD = 1SP for teams using man days, and 1 ticket = 1 SP for teams not using estimations.
Jira filter (scope) - let Ativo know which Jira issues the team is working on. the scope can be defined as a Jira projects (in case each team has a separate project), or a more complex filter in case teams are working on multiple projects, or are sharing Jira projects.

If you haven't decided on how to structure team scopes yet in Jira, we suggest to use a “one Jira project per team” configuration. This allows you to create flexible and agile workflows for each team.

Switch between "Jira board" and "custom" team configurations

You can switch a team configuration from 'Jira board' to 'custom' and vice-versa. To update an existing team, click on the 'more' and then 'edit' button of the team. Then click on 'Configure team in a custom way' or 'Configure team using a Jira board'.

How to tell the difference between both configurations? Teams configured using a 'Jira board' have a 'Jira board' selection. Teams configured in a custom way do not refer to a 'Jira board'.

When possible, use a 'Jira board' configuration, as it allows for a faster sprint selection in the Period configuration screen.