Checklists are a simple yet powerful tool that can significantly enhance Agile development in Jira. Along with basic checklist functions – making work on issues more organized, standardizing processes, and increasing transparency, checklists are necessary for specific Agile development processes such as Definition of Ready and Definition of Done lists.
What is Agile Development in Jira ?
Jira is designed to support Agile software development, and Agile project management in general. When you create a Jira software project, you can choose between two project types:
Jira Kanban Projects
Kanban uses a board to help teams visualize the flow of their work and keep the amount of work in progress at one time minimal, thereby reducing the amount of time needed to complete any given user story (Jira issue). Jira provides Kanban boards and also allows you to enable other features (backlogs, reports, etc.) in Kanban projects.
Jira Scrum Projects
While Kanban uses a visual board and continuous flow to limit the amount of work in progress, Scrum teams commit to completing a certain amount of work in defined time-frame (a Sprint) of usually not more than couple of weeks. Sprints are bookended by Sprint-planning meetings where the product owner works with the team to be determine what items from the product backlog will be included in the sprint; and a retrospective to analyze what went well, and what things could be improved upon.
Jira supports Scrum with multiple features including Backlogs, Sprints, release management and Burndown reports.
Agile Development in Jira: Checklists throughout the Software Lifecycle
Regardless of which Agile project type your team uses, there’s a clear need for checklists at various stages in the development lifecycle:
- Planning
Checklists allow you to maintain a thorough, but tidy Product Backlog. Rather than developing and maintaining every user story in your backlog, you can collapse your stories down into Checklist items on one (Epic) issue. When you’re ready to begin work on that Epic, you can convert those checklist items into issues with a single click. - Gather Requirements
- When it’s time to move an issue out of the backlog and into a Sprint (or onto a Kanban board), you need to make sure that stories, in their current state, actually can be developed. It’s helpful to create a Definition of Ready list, to ensure that only issues that have been sufficiently fleshed out make it into the Sprint.
- Designing the Solution
One aspect of being ready is that the team has clarity on what the new feature does. Here it’s useful to create an Acceptance Criteria list. This list ensures that the developed solution meets the needs defined in the user story, as well as other parameters specified by the product owner (design consistency, etc.). - Coding the Software
Most issues will have multiple steps that need to be completed. Checklists are a lightweight alternative to subtasks, that allow you to breakdown the work that needs to be done into bite-sized chunks. - Testing
Nowhere are checklists more useful than when it comes to testing. You can use them for general QA, testing across browsers, and verifying that the issue meets your team’s Definition of Done before it’s closed. - Deployment
Even with slick tools like Jira’s release hub, deployments still need to be tracked. What better way than with a checklist?
How to Create Checklists for Agile Development in Jira Projects
So how can you easily create Checklists in Jira issues? Of course, there’s nothing to stop you from creating a simple bullet list in your description field, but there are some limitations to this solution. Since the checklist would be mixed in with other text, rather than as it’s own structured field, it’s less conducive to using with automation, validators and post-functions. You can’t easily toggle between multiple checklists, nor can you see checklist progress at a glance on your Jira boards.
Checklist for Jira provides all of these benefits and allows you to make different kinds of checklists depending on your needs:
Uses of Global Checklists in Agile Development in Jira
Checklist for Jira (Enterprise) allows you to create live, admin-controlled checklists that are applied to issues via a context. Global checklists are great for implementing standards you want to enforce across multiple projects, like a Definition of Done for all of your dev projects.
Uses of Checklist Templates in Agile Development in Jira
Checklist templates are just that - templates that can be reused on multiple issues. Unlike Global checklists, checklist templates can be created, added to issues, and altered by individual users. You can also set default templates to be automatically applied per project and issue type.
Uses of Local Checklists in Agile Development in Jira
Local checklists are specific to the issue they’re created on. Use them for ad-hoc tasks, breaking down work on an issue, and listing Acceptance Criteria.
Checklist for Jira comes in Free, Pro (which is also free for small teams) and Enterprise versions. Start a free trial to see how Checklists enhance your Agile software developments.
