What is our primary use case?
When we receive a new customer requirement, the sales and marketing team inputs it into Jira Align. Then, the design team creates a task in Jira Align and assigns it to various engineers, such as hardware, electronics, and software engineers. We track the progress of these tasks and regularly update their statuses in Jira Align.
This allows everyone to log in and follow up on the progress. Once the design phase is complete, we assign a plan to the production team to build the initial sample for qualifications and verification purposes.
Once we've received approval from the customer or the marketing team, we transition the status from design to production. Our production planning coordinator then utilizes Jira Align to release the work order, especially if we've received a purchase order from the customer.
From there, it's an operational process where the warehouse follows the demand, prepares the materials, and releases them to production for building the product. This represents the general progress of our workflow in Jira Align.
What is most valuable?
I joined the company because they had a large project, and as a startup company, they needed to scale up efficiently. My task was to review the current baseline, assess the team's capabilities, and propose solutions to increase production capacity. Upon observing the process in Jira Align, I realized we didn't need to invest heavily in expanding capacity.
Instead, we could improve by optimizing the current process, particularly focusing on reducing idle and queueing times. My proposal to the management team was to introduce a lean concept, combining similar processes and materials to reduce idle and queueing time. This approach would streamline operations and address customer concerns about turnaround time.
The most significant feature of Jira Align for our project management is its ability to track and share information with all team members.
What needs improvement?
One feature that needs improvement is the tool's ability to change schedules automatically. Users can't simply drag and drop tasks to reschedule them without notifying the entire team. This lack of functionality can hinder project management control, as changes should be communicated transparently to all team members.
The solution cannot currently alert users when changes occur, which I believe is a function that it should provide. I hope that Jira Align will introduce AI functions to address this issue in the future.
We hope to utilize it further to establish connections between the development, production, and sales marketing teams for better alignment. There seems to be a gap between product design and final mass-volume production, possibly due to cost constraints or missing models.
It should also improve the support.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with the product for two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I rate Jira Align's stability an eight out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I rate the solution's scalability a six to seven out of ten. My company has 40-50 users.
How was the initial setup?
I rate the tool's deployment an eight to nine out of ten. The time it takes to deploy the solution varies depending on the project scope. Simple tasks like extracting data from Jira Align into Excel for reports can be done quickly and easily. However, deploying new processes may take a couple of weeks.
Typically, we deploy solutions with a small team of about three to five people from different functions within the company. This includes individuals from design, production, and IT who work together on the project assignment. So, not many people are required to participate in the deployment process. We have one resource to handle its maintenance.
What about the implementation team?
In our company, we've considered bringing in third parties to help with deployment but ultimately decided against it due to the associated costs. Instead, we've opted to develop solutions in-house, although it does take time to do so.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate the product an eight out of ten. It's been helpful for internal process control and information sharing, particularly in data management. Every change is recorded, allowing us to track when and why changes occur. Additionally, importing and collecting data from the system is easy.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.