If you’re managing the delivery of multiple
features or if you’re supporting the work of many
teams, Rally’s Work Views will go far to make your day-to-day check-ins a breeze.
It can be cumbersome to switch
between different pages and projects to get the
views you need on a daily basis for
work-in-flight. The Work Views page makes it easy for you
to hone in on the work you’re responsible for, while pulling together all the
data you need around that work.
Imagine the ease of having pre-prepped
pages with exactly the information you need for backlog grooming, or
planning or status meetings.
Let’s see how easy
it is to use Work Views to create your own pages in Rally that
will simplify your day-to-day work management.
Before you start, think about the specific
information goals that your new Work View will facilitate.
What types of work items do you need to see?
Will you be making changes to work items? Creating new ones?
Do you need to see parent-child relationships?
Will you use this new Work View in meetings with others?
Should you share your new Work
View with your teams? With the entire Workspace?
Let’s look at some examples of how Work Views can simplify some common activities.
Start by creating a new Work View.
Select Plan, then Work Views to begin gathering the data you want to see.
If you’ve experimented with Work Views (whether
or not you’ve formally saved your view with a name) you may see work items
on this page.
To start fresh, select the dropdown
options next to Work Views and choose Clear View.
This will clear the work items and settings in view.
Now, select the Show Filters button to constrain the information in view.
There are two primary constraints to address at first:
Project Scope and Work Item Type.
Choose the Projects you’re interested in by selecting either the “Use Global
Project Scope” or “Browse All Projects” option from the Projects dropdown list.
If you choose “Use Global Project Scope”
your views will be constrained by the place you select in the Project hierarchy
for your Workspace.
If you choose “Browse All Projects” you can
override your Global Project Scope setting by selecting specific
projects to evaluate.
Search for a Project, or expand the Project
hierarchy to select the Projects you want,
then select Done to add them to the Project filter for your data.
Next, select the Work Item Types you want in your view.
Select Add or Remove Filters to
set up some Quick Filters to further constrain your data. Or, switch to
Advanced Filters for more complex operations.
Let’s look at some examples of Work Views that
you might not be able to create from other pages in Rally.
If you’re a Program Manager or Stakeholder wanting
to know about the progress of work for specific teams, you may want to
look at the work of teams that have dependencies, but are not in the same line of
descent in the project hierarchy.
In this example, I’m interested in
work being delivered by the Fulfillment and Payment teams,
but I’m also checking progress on the Support Portal updates we need.
That work is being delivered by the Corporate API team.
I’ve chosen the appropriate teams using
the Browse All Projects option, since
I do have at least View permissions for the projects outside my organization.
I’m watching all the work performed by the Fulfillment and Payment teams
in this release, and also Feature F54 that
we’re depending upon from the API team.
I can see the progress of all that
work in one view and even show the Planned End Date if I add it as a column.
Perhaps you’re a scrum master for one or more teams.
If you like to keep your data tidy, use Work Views as an audit tool.
Sometimes we can lose track of emergent work items.
Periodically it’s good to have a look at your work items and make sure important
related data like state or release is administered correctly.
In this example I’ll first group the listed items by iteration.
Next, I’ll select the applicable work items in this view
and change the Release field value to what it should be.
Similarly, I’ll check to make sure the defects have been
accepted and are associated with a Milestone that’s been deployed.
If so, I’ll close them now.
If you’re a User Experience Designer or a Technical Writer supporting multiple
teams, Work Views can keep you one step ahead in scheduling and delivering
your own related work.
Here, I’m looking at the upcoming iterations for
the teams I’m supporting, as well as my own work for the corresponding iterations.
I can see (and perhaps tag) the work that will require
action from me, and then I can check my own schedule of work to make sure
I’ve covered any related deliverables that I’m responsible for.
If I’ve missed something, I can add it right here
in this view in the appropriate planning timeframe.
Once you’ve set up your Work View to be exactly what you want,
save it so you don’t have to create it again from scratch.
Choose Save as a New View from your Work Views
options, and then give your new view a name.
If you’re a project administrator, you can
share the view with members of the projects you administer and then send the URL
to make it easy to find from another page or application.
To share with your entire Workspace, you need to be a Workspace Administrator.
When you expand your Work Views list you can clearly see your personal Work
Views, the ones you’ve shared (as well as Projects in which they're shared).
Make sure when you share that you're providing value and the views are wanted.
If a colleague deletes a view you've shared, it will be deleted for everyone.
Now that you’ve created a Work View and maybe
even shared it with your team, think of the other views that you can customize to make
your day-to-day experience in Rally easier and more focused.
Create as many Work Views as you need.
To get started, try creating a Work View in preparation for an
upcoming meeting to display work items that will help focus the conversations taking place.
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