Initiative overview

In dragonboat, an Initiative represents a big undertaking that may have multiple Ideas. In a Responsive PPM framework, Initiative may be at the top or middle level of an organization's strategy and execution horizon.

• Initiatives (aka Programs) may span a few months, whereas projects or features often last several weeks. 
• Initiative may be the parent of 1 or more Ideas.
• An Initiative may have its own Estimates, Timeframe, Roadmap and/or Objective, different from what its children Ideas. 

This overview covers the following

• Add Initiatives
• Edit Initiatives
• Connect Ideas with Initiatives
• Display Modes
• Reporting
• Integration (with Jira Plan/ Jira Portfolio)

Add Initiatives

1. Directly Add Initiatives: clicking the "+New" button on the top, click the Add new the "+" in the spreadsheet portion of the Timeline view, or using copy and paste to import from spreadsheets. 
2. Import Ideas with Initiatives: Initiatives are automatically created when importing Ideas with Initiatives. This can be done through copy and paste from a spreadsheet or import from Jira. 
3. Import initiatives: via copy and paste from a spreadsheet, and select the data type

Import Initiative

Display Initiatives 

• Similar to editing Ideas, Initiatives can be edited within the edit screen or directly on the page when "Display: Initiative" is selected.

 

Connect Ideas with Initiatives

• Board view: Select "Group by: Initiative" and "Display: Idea" and easily drag and drop Ideas into the related Initiatives

• Initiative Edit Screen: Click on the new Ideas icon to show the list of linked Ideas to that Initiative. Add Ideas by clicking on the "+ Add Idea" button, and update the Idea fields as necessary directly on this page. 

Display

On the Manage Timeline page, there are 3 display options: Idea, Initiative, Portfolio. 

• In the Idea mode, the filter will apply to Ideas, and ideas may be grouped by Initiatives. When the story mode is turned on, stories of these Ideas will display
• In the Initiative mode, the filter will apply to Initiatives. Only Initiative will display 
• In the Portfolio mode, the filter will apply to Initiatives, all of their children ideas will display, and if the story mode is turned on, stories of these ideas will display. 

Reporting on Initiatives

• Similar to the other views in dragonboat, you can choose to display Initiative or Idea. Sometimes Executives or other stakeholders don't need to see the level of detail that displaying Ideas provides, so instead you'd display Initiative which gives a higher level view for the report. 
  • Summary: Create presentation-like views for your stakeholders by displaying Initiative and other relevant fields
  • Snapshot: Share the progress of your strategic outcomes and customize the way your group and display the information. By selecting Initiative, progress will be grouped based on the same Initiative. From there you can click on the progress report of an individual Initiative and drill into the related Ideas/Epics and Stories. 
  • Progress: Select "Display: Initiative" to see the progress towards your company's Initiatives
  • Allocation Report: Select "Display: Initiative" to align with your team on the appropriate resource allocation balance for each of your strategic drivers

Initiative linking with Jira Plan/ Portfolio

If you use Jira Portfolio / Jira Plan (as in Jira Premium Plan), an Initiative in dragonboat may be linked with Jira Parent Link.

• When you import ideas from Jira using JQL, and map Initiative with Jira Parent link, both Ideas and Initiatives will be created in dragonboat.
• The field mapping of Idea and Initiative with respective Jira issue fields is defined on the Setting page.

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