Jira Templates Explained: What They Are & Why Your Team Needs Them

For those who are new to it - Jira is a product created by Atlassian. It was launched in 2002 as an issue-tracking and project-management tool. Now, it is widely used in various industries to help teams effectively plan, manage, and monitor work. 

Jira itself makes project management easier, but to increase productivity and make work processes even more efficient, teams use Jira templates. They are the keys to successful and collaborative teamwork. These essential tools reduce setup effort, save time, and offer ready-to-use structures.  

Today, we will discuss what templates are, the different types available, and their usage guidelines.

What Are Jira Templates? 

A Jira template is a pre-built structure with predefined workflows, task structures, and automation rules for different project types. With templates, you don't need to build everything and create new setups from scratch for each new project. These ready-made designs serve different functions. They easily adapt and automate specific Jira projects - software development, marketing, or human resources. 

Templates make sure that every project has the same structure and information. When everyone uses this standard layout, it reduces errors and helps team members communicate quickly and consistently with each other.

For example, Agile Jira templates provide workflow standardization, transparency, efficiency, simplicity, time savings, and improved team collaboration. Instead of each project manager reinventing the wheel, they can simply use a template.

How Do Jira Templates Standardize Workflows?   

Templates in Jira help standardize workflows by providing:

• Unified structure — Includes essential elements like issue types, work stages, statuses, and project configurations — all necessary parts for successful project completion. 

• Consistent management — Every team member follows the same plan for all tasks, making it easy for everyone to track, control, and manage work.

• Enhanced productivity — Standardized processes allow teams to monitor progress, make decisions, and fix problems. 

• Better collaboration — Everyone can see the project status and follow clear guidelines and visible structure. 

Benefits of using Jira Template on Your Project 

Using jira project templates enables teams to improve their workflow. Here are some of the ways they do that. 

Save Time with Automation

Templates in Jira save you lots of time by doing the setup work for you. They provide pre-built boards, issue types, and workflows, so teams don’t need to build them from zero. Using Jira workflow templates, teams avoid technical setups and focus on more important tasks.

Improve Collaboration 

Templates support Agile and Scrum methodologies, helping teams collaborate effectively and clarify processes. Agile Jira templates include predefined Scrum and Kanban boards that allow teams to start planning sprints immediately.

Make the work process consistent

With the help of templates, the project is managed in a more organized and structured way. Each team member knows what they are doing, keeps track of the work process, and works within a single framework. This makes the work consistent.

Easily adaptable

One key advantage of templates is their flexibility, as you can easily change and configure them according to your wishes and project requirements. For example, marketing and HR teams need different template designs. The variety of templates makes them universally adaptable for different types of projects.  

Types of Jira Templates

 Jira offers a variety of templates, but we will explore the most commonly used ones and explain each:

1. Jira Project Templates  

Project templates come with pre-designed issue types, workflows, and additional relevant features. For example, Teams can choose between Scrum and Kanban methodologies and manage their software development projects. 

The Jira template for Kanban board uses a board where tasks progress through different stages (To Do, In Progress, Done). This enables teams to easily develop, adapt to changes, manage, and ensure transparency. This template differs from Scrum because it doesn't use time-limited Sprints. Instead, workflows continue without limitation – new tasks can start anytime, and there are no fixed timeboxes.

The Kanban template:   

·  Ensures that work is visible to everyone

·  Helps work flow smoothly

·  Gives teams more flexibility to adapt to changes 

It works better for projects that change often and need flexibility - like IT support and communication teams. 

The Jira template for Scrum board is a predefined structure for Agile teams using Scrum methodology. It helps break down work and organize it into Sprints. Scrum template includes these main parts: Backlog - A list of all tasks; Sprint - A fixed time period; Insights - Tools to improve planning.

The Scrum template in Jira helps agile teams to 

• Break big tasks into smaller ones

• Organize work into Sprints (short time periods) and deliver tasks regularly

• Keep a well-organized backlog where all tasks are stored and prioritized 

• Set clear priorities

• Deliver working products (like an app, website, or marketing campaign) after each Sprint

 Scrum works best for projects that need:

• Clear structure in the workflow

• Consistent processes that the team follows

• Detailed planning

• Well-defined roles for each team member

The Bug Tracking template helps software teams identify, manage, and fix bugs efficiently. It's useful for software and programming teams that need to track, check, and analyze bugs, and collaborate with other team members on the project. 

2. Jira Workflow Templates 

Workflow Templates are ready-made and standardized processes used to manage the lifecycle of issues in Jira. A workflow is the path that shows how issues move from start to finish. Each workflow has specific statuses and transitions that your issue follows from beginning to end. They are automatically standardized in Templates, so you don't need to configure them yourself: 

• Statuses — Where the issue is now (Open, In Progress, Scheduled, Pending, Waiting) 

• Transitions — How issues move between statuses

• Resolutions — How issues are completed (Closed, Resolved, Shipped, Completed, Done, Finalized) 

Jira Workflow Templates help organizations create consistent processes and unified structures across projects.  These templates work well for big organizations managing large projects in Software Development, IT Operations, Service Management, and HR.  

3. Jira Automation Templates

Automation Templates are ready-made automation rules that help teams automate tasks, processes, and workflows.  

Jira Automation works based on rules, which consist of the following three components:

• Trigger - Starts the automation process. It sets when the automation should happen (for example - automatically assigning a task to a team when a new issue is created).

• Condition - Checks if the action should run. It looks at certain requirements before moving forward (for example - Only run the automation if the issue status is "Completed").

• Action - Defines what the rule will do (for example - Notify the assignee when the issue status is "Done"). 

These Jira templates save time and reduce manual work. They also improve team communication, help avoid mistakes, and make managing processes easier. 

4. Jira Issue Templates

Jira Issue templates are predefined forms for making new issues that help keep projects consistent. Their main purpose is to standardize processes and set up fields, descriptions, and necessary details for each issue type. In Jira, templates are different depending on the issue type. There are:

• Task Template – For regular work tasks 

• Story Template – For describing users’ requirements and how things should work

• Bug Template – For identifying and fixing bugs

• Epic Template – For big tasks or projects made up of many smaller tasks

• Sub-task Template – For breaking bigger tasks into smaller pieces 

How to Use Jira Templates Effectively 

Ready-made templates for Jira make work easier and speed up project management. To apply templates: 

• Open the Jira dashboard and click "Create Project" 

• Select your project type

• Pick a template from the list

• Customize the template by adding/removing fields, workflows, and issue types

• Configure the template to fit your team's needs (define permissions, set up automation rules) 

• Click "Create" and the template will set up your project

  
  

Best Practices for Customizing Jira Templates 

When you adapt Agile Jira templates or other models for your project, make sure they fit the team's requirements. Here's how to customize them effectively:

1. Examine your team's needs and requirements.

2. Understand Your Team's Workflow – Check if you need different issue types or workflow steps and adjust templates to best fit your team's needs. 

3. Pick a template that matches your working methodology and team needs.

4. Add only necessary custom fields – Too many fields make things confusing and harder to manage.

5. Customize Workflows – By adjusting the steps and statuses, you can make things run better.

6. Use Automation – Set up automation rules and customize Jira automation templates for your project. 

7. Tailoring the content - Customize the content. Add the necessary information to the template for your project.

8. Make sure templates are user-friendly, easily understandable, and simple to operate. 

Common Mistakes to Avoid when working with Jira templates

Teams often make certain mistakes when working with templates, which reduce their efficiency: 

• Selecting the wrong template – Choose one that suits your project. 

• Overloading the template with too many features – Including too many custom fields, workflows, or automation rules can complicate the template. So, keep things simple.  

• Making the workflow too complex – Adding too many steps or statuses can make the workflow too complex. Use simple and clear Jira workflow templates.  

• Not making templates easy for everyone to understand and not testing them first.   

Does Your Team Need Jira Templates? 

To sum up, templates are pre-configured structures that help Jira teams collaborate more effectively, create smooth workflows, and simplify work processes. There are various Jira templates, but the main types include Project, Workflow, Automation, and Issue Templates. 

For best results, choose the right template for your team, keep it simple, and avoid adding unnecessary features. Adding templates to your Jira will make work easier and much more flexible. They will save time, improve team communication, and become the key to your project success and efficiency.   

If you are looking for standardizing Jira issue Templates you should explore Issue Templates Pro - Issue Description Templates for Jira