Jira

Atlassian's Jira is a common project management tool used to keep track of and oversee work on a project. It is a web-based platform which enables project teams to establish and review issues, organise work, and track project progress.

Jira facilitates project management like no other. As a centralised platform, it can help project managers monitor all activities on the project, makes it easy for stakeholders and team members to see progress on the project, and allows for finding potential issues. Jira also has a comment feature, making collaboration easier as anyone can comment on a task and tag the right person to respond. Jira is also fully customisable, so it's perfect for various project management methodologies such as Scrum and Kanban (often used in Agile Methodologies). Because of that, it can also be adapted to any project and any needs of the project team. And since Jira is very popular, it can now be integrated with other tools and platforms like GitHub, Confluence, or Slack.

Successful use of Jira means using it for what it was meant for: project management (especially for software development projects). You should customise it according to your project and team's needs to maximise its potential. And use Jira actively; keep it up to date and post any new issues, tasks, and progress updates so that everyone on the team knows at what stage the project is.

What should you avoid? For one, don't treat Jira as a to-do list. It's a project management tool and shouldn't be used to track individual tasks. You also shouldn't put too much information into Jira. Stick with what's essential, and if something isn't necessary for the task or the project, don't post it on Jira. Finally, don't limit your communication to Jira and the comment section it offers. Use other available channels to communicate with your team members and stakeholders, like email, chat, or video calls.

Jira is a valuable tool for project managers that keeps the team in check and the project on track.