The Portfolios tab

Transcript

What needs you today

The Portfolios tab is where you land: here you can see at a glance what needs you today, and how each portfolio is doing. Each item says what is wrong, names the related portfolio, and carries the buttons that fix it. Red is what needs an action now: like work that should have ended before today and is not done, or people booked over their hours in the next two weeks. Amber is what needs an action this week: like a task that starts before the work it waits for, someone on leave with work planned, or a project heading over budget. Blue is what to tidy up when you can: like backlog tasks with no dates, or tasks with no estimate. Not for now? Hide an item until something changes; red ones cannot be hidden. In this tab, Admins also have access to Workspace setup: this contains what only an Admin can fix, like a person in no portfolio or missing cost rates.

Every portfolio

Below, every portfolio: here you can see its status, the projects and people in it, the team's load for the next four weeks, its budget, and how well it performs against its schedule. A portfolio is one team's plan: a set of Jira projects, the people who work on them, and the Planners who plan them. Setup creates the first one for you, the Lobby. You can rename it as you wish, and of course you can set up as many portfolios as you need. New portfolio starts one: a name, then its projects and its people.

A portfolio's page

Open a portfolio, and its tabs show what it holds. Overview brings it together: what needs attention, how much is on schedule, each project, and the team's load week by week. Projects: its Jira projects, and the issue types it plans from each. People: the portfolio's team, with each person's load. Money: each project's sold value, budget, the cost so far, and the projected profit. Access: the Planners who plan here, and the Board members who have access to view it. Manage, for Admins: here only Admins can rename the portfolio, reset its data, or delete it.

All projects

All projects lists every Jira project, and which portfolio plans each of its issue types. Only Admins can change it. One Jira project can be shared between portfolios only if each portfolio handles different issue types: for example, stories, tasks and subtasks can be planned in one portfolio, while bugs are handled by another. You can bring in another Jira project from Add project. Each row shows when it was last pulled. Sync from brings in earlier history, if you want it. Edit sets a project's colour; Archive takes a finished one off the calendar, and reports keep it. Reset and Remove from sync act on the project in every portfolio; Jira is never changed.

All people

All people lists everyone you plan: their country, portfolios, login, rates and status. The filters find who needs something: no portfolio, no login, no cost rate. Most people need no login; they keep working in Jira. Give one from the menu on their row, as Planner, Board or Admin. Sign-in only holds logins that are not planned, like the owner or Board members. Edit sets each person's cost and billable rates, for project cost and profit. Everyone is planned Monday to Friday, eight hours a day, until you give them a working pattern. Working pattern, on the menu of their row: the date it starts, and their hours on each day of the week. From that date, their capacity, overload and reports follow it; holidays and leave still come off. Their country sets their public holidays. When someone leaves, start with Redistribute open tasks. Select their tasks, then click a person to give them the tasks; each keeps its start and its hours, and its end follows the new person's working days. Then Deactivate: they leave the calendar and the people lists, and their history stays in reports.

Workspace

Workspace holds what an Admin sets once: the subscription plan, and how many people it allows. The Jira connection, and the account Mermix acts as in Jira. The Jira fields Mermix reads and writes; keep Jira's own Start date. And how far back and ahead the calendar reaches for everyone. That's the Portfolios tab: every team's plan, and what needs you, in one place.