You probably know the age-old axiom: knowledge is power.
This might be true, however, it comes with a few conditions.
First, you need to have a way to access knowledge. Easily and quickly if possible. Also, this knowledge must be accurate, and it must be used the right way. Unfortunately, in the workplace — these 3 conditions can hardly be met. And it can be incredibly costly to a business.
That’s why managing knowledge the right way is key to a company’s success, and we’ll help you here by providing knowledge management best practices and tips to choose the best knowledge management system for your company’s needs.
What is knowledge management?
First, what is knowledge?
Let’s begin with the Cambridge Dictionary definition: knowledge is the “understanding of or information about a subject that you get by experience or study, either known by one person or by people generally”.
Two important notions here: first, the fact that knowledge can be acquired not only by study but also by experience, and that it can be known not only by one person but by people in general. In that sense, the experience and skills gained by a collaborator across the years are aimed to be shared across an organization. A typical example would be the onboarding of a new employee, a time when it is essential to transfer the company’s knowledge and practices.
What is knowledge management and why it’s important?
As defined by Atlassian, “knowledge management is the process of creating, curating, sharing, using, and managing knowledge across an organization”.
Knowledge is one of the greatest assets of an organization. When an employee leaves the company and the knowledge acquired by this person has not been stored or passed along to others, it constitutes a high risk of information loss for the company.
Knowledge management’s goal is to maintain all the company’s learnings and history and make it easily accessible to all.
This is even more crucial nowadays, with teams working from everywhere with different schedules and across different time zones. Going to the desk or office next door, and tapping the shoulder of your colleague for information might not be possible anymore. All team members must be able to asynchronously share their knowledge and learnings and get access to it whenever and wherever they are.
What are the benefits of knowledge management?
Half of all respondents in a recent survey conducted by Deloitte identified knowledge sharing as a key driver to team success. From offering a single source of truth to improving collaboration and productivity, managing knowledge efficiently can be highly beneficial for companies and teams.
Better collaboration & team communication
Effective knowledge management is the path to successful knowledge transfer. Sharing learnings across teams and team members prevents company silos and enhances communication throughout your organization. It fosters collaboration as people are more aligned, have clearer goals, and have more transparency in their work.
Single source of truth & high-quality data
Having multiple tools to store information usually leads to time loss, looking for what you need, duplicated data, or outdated information. To have a single, reliable source of truth where everyone can find the information they need, is one of the main goals of knowledge management. It gives efficient access to knowledge as well as improved quality of information.
Improved productivity
According to a McKinsey study, employees spend nearly 20% of their time searching for the information they need to do their jobs. With an effective system to share knowledge and information, productivity could be improved by 30 to 35%.
Faster decision-making
To give the right information to the right people at the right time. That’s the key to making more informed and data-driven decisions. When information is shared transparently across the entire organization, everyone has the tools to work toward the same goals.
What are the main types of knowledge management?
Explicit knowledge
Explicit knowledge is the most apparent form of knowledge: it includes any formalized documentation, written processes, or reports. Everything that is easy to write down and pass along.
Explicit knowledge is usually the first and the easiest type of information you can store and make accessible to your team. The challenge here will be to keep it accurate and up-to-date.
Examples of explicit knowledge: reports, formalized processes, product documentation, and technical user guides.
Implicit knowledge
Implicit knowledge is the practical application of explicit knowledge to a specific situation.
For example, if explicit knowledge is the user guide of your new camera, implicit knowledge will be gained when you apply that information in order to take beautiful portrait pictures.
It can be hard to capture and document, as it’s, essentially, learned skills or know-hows.
Examples of implicit knowledge: best practices and how-tos
Tacit knowledge
Tacit knowledge is the knowledge that is gained from personal experience.
Think of your grandmother’s famous recipes. It is usually never written down. She just knows how to cook them from the thousand times she already did it. Which quantity of flour to add, the right way to mix the ingredients together, the exact time in the oven… You will have a hard time learning how to make those, as this knowledge is based on experience and intuition.
As tacit knowledge is intangible information, it becomes really difficult to write it down and explain it in a straightforward way.
Examples of tacit knowledge: how to speak another language, cultural traditions, and customs, missions like sales or leadership where complex social skills are involved
Your organization’s ability to capture and retain all types of knowledge is at the same time essential and challenging. But once mastered, it can represent a huge competitive advantage.
Knowledge management best practices
Knowledge is one of your organization’s most valuable assets. But only if managed efficiently. Here are 5 best practices we recommend to get better knowledge management.
1. Aggregate your team’s knowledge in a single system
To democratize knowledge, companies first need to centralize it in a digital information hub, usually called Knowledge Management System (KMS). The goal is to avoid having information scattered across different tools, or in your colleagues’ minds. Choosing the right system is important, so we prepare a list of questions to ask yourself when choosing a knowledge management system, available at the end of this article.
2. Increase transparency with open and shared information
Preventing company silos has become more and more of a challenge with the COVID-19 pandemic’s scattering of staff among homes and work sites, and even across different countries and time zones. Increase transparency in your company by providing open and easy access to knowledge, and encouraging team members to collaborate and share information.
3. Make information fun & easy-to-consume
Prioritize brief articles and FAQs to long articles and procedures (you don’t want the acronym “TLDR” to be used to describe your content). Share your information in a user-friendly way to that readers will be eager to read it. As you know “a picture is worth a thousand words”, so don’t hesitate to use images and graphs to convey your message. For instance, at Elements, we create sprint posters for each development sprint to illustrate its main objectives. Atlassian also suggests creating a project poster for every major initiative, to share your goals and progress with the rest of the team and stakeholders.
4. Foster a knowledge-sharing culture
Faris Behme and Sandy Becker of Deloitte explain that “in the context of generating, sharing, and managing knowledge, organizations cannot underestimate the human factor.” If team members don’t have the will or the motivation to share knowledge and information, even the best platforms and tools will be useless. Enable employees on knowledge management best practices, and foster a knowledge-sharing mindset so that they recognize the value for themselves and for the company.
5. Measure and improve continuously
Don’t let your KMS gather dust. Adopt a “kiwi gardener” attitude to keep it clean and up-to-date so that it continues to be a relevant and valuable resource for employees. Measure user engagement and participation in knowledge transfer, and run regular audits to check if the platform and knowledge management processes are still aligned with user needs.
Choosing a Knowledge management system
It is no coincidence that we listed “Aggregate your team’s knowledge in a single system” as the first position in our knowledge management best practices. As Nate Martins from Notion says, “without a system, knowledge isn’t tangible. It lives in employees’ heads.”
But before jumping into selecting the software for your knowledge management system (KMS), you must consider several elements, from administration capabilities to usability and user experience.
Here are the key questions to ask yourself to make the right choice for your KMS:
Download this checklist here, to help you choose your KMS.
Atlassian tools for knowledge management
Several software can be used for knowledge management. From more generic ones like Notion or Monday, to specific ones like Document 360, Confluence, or Tettra, the offer is wide.
If you are already using some tools from the Atlassian suite (like ourselves), such as Jira Software or Jira Service Management, getting Confluence can be a great addition to manage knowledge and link your tools together.
With easy content creation, organization, and a powerful search engine, Confluence provides an accessible platform for knowledge management. Also, combined with Jira Service Management when used for customer support, for instance, it can offer a self-serve knowledge base so that customers find themselves the answers to common questions, without having to create a new ticket.
To go further and learn how to implement knowledge management best practices with Atlassian tools, check out our article on how to create a knowledge base article in Confluence directly from a Jira ticket.
Remember when you were a small kid, this moment when you graduated from four-piece puzzles to bigger canvases?
Elements evolves. We’ve redesigned our apps logos to reflect the maturity of our offerings, while keeping our iconic visual system based on primary shapes that evokes the idea of elements you assemble together.
We get a similar feeling of excitement with this new refreshed look! It reflects how Elements has grown and matured over the past four years, tackling challenges such as going Cloud-first, elevating our performance and security standards, bringing new exciting features to our customers…
We designed the new logos with the goals that they convey meaning about what each app does, and can be easily differentiated from one another.
Connect’s functions like a magnet.
Copy & Sync’s evokes the concepts of reflection and synchronisation.
Spreadsheet’s represents a sheet and cells
Publish’s conveys the idea of document publication.
We look forward to the years to come, and remain passionate about bringing the missing pieces to your Atlassian puzzle so your teams are more efficient and delighted.
Your Scrum or Kanban board is set up, complete with Epics, User Stories, Tasks, and Bugs for the sprint. There’s no doubt about it: Jira Software is a valuable tool for your engineering team. However, Jira alone might not be the best at documenting decisions, sharing wireframes or mock-ups, or summarizing progress for colleagues who do not use Jira daily.
By using Confluence alongside Jira Software throughout the entire software development process, you can build an internal knowledge base that sets your team up for success. Get inspired by the following suggestions on how to use Jira Software and Confluence together to achieve a shared understanding, and support the successful release of your software.
Enhancing agile development with Jira and Confluence integration
Jira Software excels at tracking distinct tasks for upcoming releases, but it falls short in creating a comprehensive shared history and knowledge base. That’s where Confluence performs: it organizes and shares ideas, content, and files critical for your project. If your project resources are scattered across Word documents, Drive, SharePoint, or other platforms, your team is likely wasting time locating necessary materials. By synchronizing Jira and Confluence, you can streamline this process, ensuring all project information is centrally located and easily accessible. This integration not only saves time but also enhances project efficiency.
Building tribal knowledge: 4 key strategies for agile software teams:
1. Structured knowledge organization
- Hierarchical page organization: Establish a clear hierarchy of pages for each team or project within Confluence and link this space directly to your Jira project. This setup enhances accessibility, allowing team members to access relevant pages directly from Jira, which optimizes navigation and efficiency.
2. Transparent project updates
- Project update pages: Develop a dedicated page in Confluence using Jira macros to display real-time issue statuses. This approach ensures that even stakeholders who do not use Jira regularly can stay updated on project progress, enhancing decision-making and project transparency.
3. Streamlined sprint processes
- Sprint planning and retrospective templates: Leverage Confluence templates for sprint planning and retrospectives to document necessary actions and reflect on completed sprints. This structured documentation aids in maintaining clarity and focus throughout the sprint cycle, promoting continuous improvement and alignment with agile methodologies.
4. Integrated documentation and tracking
- Linking documentation to issues: Integrate your documentation effectively by linking Confluence pages to Jira issues, enhancing team productivity by keeping all related information accessible within the Atlassian ecosystem. This seamless integration ensures that team members can access relevant documentation, roadmaps, or issue data directly from Confluence, facilitating a more organized and efficient workflow.
Simplified cloud integration
- Automatic app links on Cloud: For teams utilizing cloud-based platforms, integrating Jira and Confluence is straightforward with automatic app linking. Simply connect your Jira project with your Confluence space to seamlessly view, create, and modify project-related documentation directly from Jira.
By adopting these strategies, agile software teams can significantly boost their productivity and collaboration. Integrating Jira and Confluence not only simplifies project management but also strengthens the foundation of knowledge sharing and operational transparency essential for agile success.
Important points to remember:
Pages must be included under Pages in Confluence to be accessible from Jira.
While Jira displays Pages, it does not show Blogs.
Centralizing all project-related documents and content in Confluence optimizes your knowledge management. Future team members and non-Jira using colleagues will thank you, we promise.
Jira Software and Confluence for Product Management
Integrating Confluence with Jira Software brings vast opportunities for Product Managers and enhances the success of software releases.
Jira and Confluence for effective requirements management
Utilize Jira and Confluence as your agile toolkit for ongoing requirements management throughout your product development lifecycle.
Confluence comes equipped with a dedicated blueprint or template for requirements management, allowing you to hit the ground running. This setup enables you to easily gather, share, and iterate on feedback. Stakeholders can engage directly by commenting on the text, the page, or making edits themselves—with all changes trackable via the page history.
As the requirements are detailed, you can start creating User Stories for them in Jira directly from Confluence by highlighting the text.
Incorporating wireframes, mockups, or prototypes into a Confluence page is streamlined with various apps, centralizing all your work in one place. Team members can comment on these visuals just as they would on text or other images.
Confluence enhances visibility by automatically generating a summary page from your requirements management blueprints. This feature provides a quick overview of the status across all your projects, making it easier to track progress and updates.
Discuss, debate build consensus with DACI
Have you ever puzzled over a decision made months ago by people no longer on your project? The DACI framework offers a structured approach to document decision-making processes effectively.
The DACI (Driver, Approver, Contributors, Informed) template in Confluence is specifically designed to consolidate all essential information for discussing and debating pending decisions. This template facilitates:
- Documenting inputs: Clearly outlines all the information required to address the decision at hand.
- Evaluating options: Lists the advantages and disadvantages, alongside the potential impact of each proposed solution.
By using the DACI template, you not only build consensus for the selected solution but also preserve this knowledge for future reference. For instance, when deciding on the best approach to develop a new feature or resolve a bug, you can create a dedicated page in Confluence. Import the relevant details from the Jira issue using Elements Publish recipe, then begin detailing each potential option, ensuring all decision-making is transparent and accessible.
Check out the Atlassian play for tips on how to use the DACI framework with your colleagues. Once you’ve come to a decision, don’t forget to update the status so that anyone looking at the decision log with the list of DACI pages will know at a glance if a decision has been taken.
A slight alternative is the RACI, or Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed.
- Responsible is those who will complete the work.
- Accountable is the final approver of the work.
- Consulted and Informed are the same.
Managing Jira Software release notes in Confluence
Jira Software allows for project organization using versions, which introduces the capability to automatically generate release notes. These notes compile all issues within a version into a categorized list by issue types.
To publish release notes, you have two options: directly from Jira or through Confluence.
In Jira Software, navigate to ‘Releases’ in the left-hand panel. For detailed instructions on generating a release note, refer to the relevant Atlassian documentation.
You can then copy all the changes associated with your release and paste them into a document you’re creating in Confluence.
From Confluence, click on create and then from the Templates in the side navigation menu select “Jira report”. When you click “Use” select “Change log”.
Then you’ll need to select the project and version. Confluence will automatically fetch all the issues and create your release note.
⚠️ You are launching a new page under the currently open parent page to provide the latest updates. To avoid having to move the page after creating it, make sure you open the right parent page before creating a new page and using the Jira Report template.
Incident management: post-mortems with Jira and Confluence
You’ve pushed a change to production, and it didn’t go as planned. To refine your change management process, gathering everyone for a thorough analysis is essential. Atlassian’s Confluence offers numerous templates to compile all necessary information for continuous improvement and even includes a guide for conducting these meetings.
However, creating a post-mortem document in Confluence can be labor-intensive, as it often involves manually transferring bug details from Jira Software. To simplify this process, the app Elements Publish automates the transfer of information from your Jira Software issue directly into a new post-mortem page in Confluence.
With everything prebuilt, your dev team can focus on the root cause analysis, not copying and pasting.
Driving Success in Software Development Teams:
Using Jira Software and Confluence together throughout your software development process builds essential tribal knowledge for team success. Whether enhancing sprint retrospectives, managing product requirements, or streamlining incident management, integrating Confluence with Jira Software ensures that all decisions are well-documented and accessible, even to stakeholders not using Jira. To start leveraging both tools effectively, explore our guide on 8 ways to integrate Jira and Confluence or try the Elements Publish app for seamless documentation management.
Change Management is one of the four ITIL modules supported by Jira service projects. To implement it successfully, you need to set up workflows that support existing best practices. In this article, we will cover just that: what is a workflow in Jira, how to set it up so that it supports the change management process and how to enhance it for a better experience.
Change management process in Jira Service Management (formerly Jira Service Desk)
A typical change procedure consists of five to six steps:
- Creating the change: Who raised it, the reason for it, which area it impacts and the priority it has
- Reviewing the change: Is the request complete, relevant, and correctly filled out?
- Assessment: What is the cost, benefit, risk and scope? Is it justified and what impact will it have?
- Implementation: Actually introducing the change on relevant assets
- Review: Was the change successful?
- EXTRA – Retrospective: What can we improve next time?
Atlassian has also nicely summed the procedure up in this article. You implement this into Jira through a workflow. But exactly what is a workflow in Jira?
Simply put, it’s an ordered set of steps necessary to complete a task. The steps are represented by statuses, and the order by transitions between statuses. For example, this is a very simple three-step workflow.
Open, In progress and Done are statuses, while the arrows pointing between each are transitions.
That said, what should you do to implement a change management workflow? It’s simple: transform the theoretical change management process into concrete Jira statuses and transitions!
Setting up change management workflows in JSM
Let’s present two possible ways you might want to approach this. A simple tracking of changes and a “true” ITIL change management.
Workflow 1: Simple change tracking
The first approach is for small teams that don’t need to adhere to a strict ITIL method, but they could definitely benefit from implementing a simple change management process in their Jira – they would see who requests, approves and implements which tickets and steer the whole procedure in the right direction.
For such a straightforward use case, they could use a workflow like this:
Workflow 2: ITIL Change Management
In case you’d need to configure a more robust solution, you could use the IT Service management project template. By default, a “Jira Service management change management workflow” is included in it, and looks like this:
This is the Cloud one; on-premise, it’s very similar. It has all the necessary change management steps, including various outcomes. The best part is that this is only a workflow template that you can adjust however you see fit. So how would you do that?
Editing workflows
This approach works if you already have a project created and you’d like to change its existing workflow. First, you need to having global admin privileges. In the project where you want to adjust the change management workflow, explore the project settings. Find the workflow you want to edit.
Choose the pen icon next to its name to enter the edit mode and display the workflow diagram.
To introduce a new status, choose the “Add status” button on the top left side of the editor. Once you add it, connect it to the workflow by choosing and dragging one of the circles on the status and dropping it to another one, as in the picture below. This way, you create a one-way transition.
If you want to remove a status, select it and choose “Remove status” on the right side.
Finally, you would save the workflow by choosing “Publish” at the top of the page.
Novice admins should modify existing workflows than create new ones, as they contain many detailed settings that you would need to keep in mind when creating a new workflow from scratch, such as automatic resolution screens, different notification events and proper workflow schemes.
In this article, Atlassian described several directions this default change workflow can take depending on the type of the created change, its risk and priority.
Emergency changes are those that need to be assessed and implemented as quickly as possible, and their process is shorter. Standard changes are frequent operations that have a pre-established procedure that needs less planning and approvals. Finally, normal changes require significant planning and assessing, as they cover important changes.
To use the default change management workflow to support these operations, you can either “hardcode” the three types of directions with Conditions depending on issue field values, or simply keep the workflow open for all change types.
Tips to improve change management workflows
Connect Jira to your asset management tool
Connecting changes to the relevant assets and stakeholders is key to successful change management.
Linking a Jira change ticket with the impacted asset helps both reporters and agents, by making the process simpler and adding the necessary context and a historical record that a change ticket had affected the device.
Now how to connect Jira to your Asset Management tool?
The Asset Management solution offer is wide: from Atlassian’s Insight (part of Jira Premium offer), to external CMDB (configuration management data base) and ITAM (IT Asset Management) tools.
If you are using Insight, you can add an Asset field from Insight on the Jira issue create screen (or a transition screen, depending on how complex your workflow is) to link the change with the asset. For external tools, you can use the app Elements Connect to retrieve data on your assets and populate Jira custom fields with it.
Set approvals automatically from the right stakeholders
Every asset usually have a responsible team or person that takes care of it. This stakeholder may be the approver for necessary changes. Or perhaps a Change advisory board (CAB) needs to approve the change.
Being able to automate the approval process and assign automatically the ticket to the right stakeholders can save a lot of time and repetitive work. To know more on how to get approvals automatically from the right stakeholders and set the assignation automatically, read this article.
Set your change management workflows up for success
Implementing a change management process in Jira is simple; you don’t have to start big. Try running your changes through a simple workflow like the one we proposed above, or leverage the Jira Service Management change management workflow provided with the default template. Modify it as you see fit, and remember that apps like Elements Connect can save you a lot of repetitive work.
Are you looking for a way to monitor the change requests made by your stakeholders with Jira? Automate setting the approver on the issue for a change request? Maybe both, but your manager/approver information is stored in an external database? Providing answers to all those questions is the goal of this article.
Get approval from the right stakeholders in change management
As defined by ITIL, change management is the process used to minimize the disruption in your IT processes, for example when completing upgrades or changes in your workflow or services. The change management process is designed to reduce incidents, dissolve silos, avoid bottlenecks and reduce risk.
To manage the process, we usually set a change advisory board (CAB) or we choose a specialist such as a manager to accept these changes. This point of contact will become the approver of your change management process within Jira. By adding an approval step into your workflow, you can monitor the changes and let your team leader know when there are problems, and take action to fix them. The mission of this approver is to review all the proposed changes, evaluate any risk for the change, and then decide how to proceed. By doing so, they help the company to reduce risk and avoid unnecessary changes.
Let’s look at the importance of adding approvals to your change management workflows in Jira and then how to set approvers automatically with the help of Elements Connect.
Set a Jira user as an approver automatically natively with Jira workflows
When creating a new Jira project, Atlassian provides preconfigured projects with workflows and pre-set fields for a change management approval process. In Jira Service Management you can find the change management workflow. Atlassian based this workflow on ITIL principles and it looks like this:
Of course, this workflow covers several types of change requests, and not all change requests should follow the same path. By creating rules with Jira Automation, requests can move through the workflow automatically depending to the importance of the change. Three different paths can be taken based on the impact of the change:
- Emergency: A rapid assessment and implementation of an emergency change is required
- Standard: This refers to your everyday, repeatable change
- Normal: Non-emergency but also non-repeatable changes that require some risk assessment
Change management approval can be configured automatically in Jira with the native option provided by Atlassian. You can easily add approvals to your workflow by editing the workflow and adding an approver to the step you choose:
Next, fill the field in the popup window and set the appropriate approver from within the Jira users database.
Use an LDAP to set the manager of the reporter as approver on Jira On-Premise
Let’s imagine you want to set the manager of the reporter (or the infrastructure manager of the asset in the request) as approver, and this information is stored in an AD or LDAP. This use case is possible with the help of Elements Connect.
4 steps to use an LDAP to set the approver
- Connect your Jira Server/Data Center instance to the LDAP datasource
- Create Elements Connect fields to retrieve information from LDAP: the reporter’s manager and his Jira username. Thanks to the LDAP connection, we can get those details to then assign the reporter as approver.
- Adapt the workflow transition to retrieve the previous data and populate Elements Connect fields automatically upon issue creation thanks to post-functions.
- Set the manager as approver, by adding the Elements Connect custom field “Reporter’s manager” as approval to our workflow for the “Waiting for Approval” status:
Follow the full tutorial on the Elements Connect On-Premise documentation.
Set a Jira user as an approver automatically based on external data on Jira Cloud
4 steps to set an approver based on external data on Jira Cloud
- Create and configure the datasource in Elements Connect
- Create and configure the Connected items in Elements Connect
- Associate the Connected items to a request type / issue type
- Configure a Jira Automation rule
- This rule will copy the value of the “Approver” mirror field in the “Approver” Jira user field every time the “Approver” mirror field is updated
Follow the full tutorial on the Elements Connect Cloud documentation.
Set your change management process up for success
Ticket approval is critical in change management: to resolve emergencies, mitigate risk when planning normal changes, or just make make life smooth for standard changes, you need approval from the right stakeholders. While you can set approvals natively with Jira, Elements Connect helps you go further by integrating external data from an LDAP or AD.
Is your company transitioning to agile methodologies? “Jira and Confluence integration is now a strategic move for businesses exploring the Atlassian ecosystem. Jira excels in software development, IT Service Management (ITSM), and has recently expanded into business task tracking. Concurrently, Confluence serves as an ideal content management system for corporate intranets, product documentation, and customer knowledge bases. If you’ve been inspired by our explanation of why you should use Jira and Confluence together but don’t currently have the tools integrated, read on.
Why set up a Jira and Confluence integration?
Integrating Jira and Confluence can revolutionize the way teams collaborate, reducing silos of information and processes. By linking these powerful tools, you enhance team productivity and leverage their full capabilities seamlessly. With this integration, teams can effortlessly publish Jira issues to Confluence pages, integrate their Jira roadmaps into Confluence, or even create Jira issues directly from Confluence.
Discover more benefits in our detailed guide on 8 effective ways to utilize Jira and Confluence together.
If your organization already utilizes both Jira and Confluence but hasn’t integrated them, doing so can streamline workflows and significantly reduce the need to toggle between systems, thus minimizing user frustration and optimizing time management.
How to integrate Jira with Confluence?
The process to follow depends on the hosting you are using: Cloud or On-Premise versions Server or Data Center. (BTW, if you aren’t sure if you are on Cloud or Server/Data Center, look at your url or the bottom of your page as explained in this Community article).
Differences between a Jira and Confluence integration in Cloud versus Server/Data Center
What are the main differences?
- If you are on Cloud and have added Jira and Confluence to the same site, the integration is done automatically
- If you are on Server or Data Center, you have to configure the integration manually.
Configuring Jira and Confluence to work together on these platforms involves specific steps to ensure seamless collaboration and functionality between the two systems.
As explained in Atlassian’s documentation, the integration can be done with the bundled app Application Links that allows you to connect Atlassian products to each other. Here are the 4 steps, starting from Confluence.
1. Go to your general configuration and with a quick search, you can choose Application Links.
2. Enter the URL of the Atlassian product you want to link (in this example, Jira).
3. Follow the different steps inside the wizard to configure the link.
4. You will be redirected from Confluence over to Jira to confirm the app link in the other direction (and then sent back to Confluence to finish the process).
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⚠️ When you are configuring the Application Link you will have a choice between the option “The servers have the same set of users” which will use an OAuth authentication, or the option “I am an administrator on both instances” which creates a one-way link. When you use a one-way link, you will be in a read-only operating mode.
If you run into any problems, check out the troubleshooting guide provided by Atlassian.
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Jira and Confluence integration in Cloud
Working with Jira and Confluence Cloud is straightforward. When both tools are used on the same site, integration is automatic upon activation of both products. This seamless setup ensures that you can start leveraging the combined capabilities of Jira and Confluence without any additional configuration.
If you are using Jira Software, you can quickly connect your Jira project with a Confluence space or page using the feature “Project Pages“:
If you need to link Jira and Confluence instances that are hosted on different Cloud sites, you will need to configure an app link.
Remote App Links on Jira Cloud
To set up your link between different Cloud sites, find Application Links through the administration panel (try the shortcut “GG” to pull up an administration panel you can search from).
From this point, copy/paste the url of the site and product you want to link:
If you are not the admin of the remote Cloud instance, a popup window will open in which you will have several options to configure this new link:
Otherwise, you’ll just be directed to the remote instance to confirm the link, then returned to your original instance. That’s it, you just integrated remote Jira and Confluence Cloud instances.
Your team can easily use the new Jira and Confluence integration: the remote Jira is accessible for example in the Confluence Jira chart with only a few clicks.
Maximize the benefits of your Jira and Confluence integration
Integrating Jira and Confluence sets the stage for more streamlined project management and boosts team productivity. This synergy ensures that the right information is accessible in the appropriate context, processes are optimized for efficiency, and potentially, your delivery timelines are accelerated.
Ready to practice? Try publishing your Jira Roadmap to Confluence, creating issues directly from Confluence, or even publishing issue data to a Confluence page. Learn more in our article 8 ways to use Jira and Confluence together.
Importing your Excel files in Confluence can bring many benefits to your team:
- Centralizing information. No more searching in different drives or mailboxes to find the latest version of the file you want. No more wondering if someone worked on the document on their personal desktop and you are not informed. With a single Confluence sheet, the data you look at will always be up-to-date.
- Fostering team collaboration. You and your team can work on the same document, inside the collaborative environment of Confluence. Thus reducing the risk of errors and the time and effort necessary to maintain multiple file versions and send them internally.
- Contextualizing data. By embedding your spreadsheets in Confluence, you can surround the tables with descriptions and comments to help colleagues understand the data and what insights they can get from it.
As you can see the advantages are numerous, but when looking at how to take the leap and integrate Excel tables in your Confluence page there are plenty of options to choose from. Let’s explore the alternatives available and discuss which ones are best suited to collaborate on data in Confluence.
Pull data from Excel to Confluence: your 3 options
The recent versions of Confluence allow you to pull data from Excel to Confluence in various ways. To help you determine which one is right for you, we’ll briefly explore the different solutions to add spreadsheets in Confluence in the section below.
Using the Atlassian companion app
The plugin adds an edit button that allows you to open your files in Excel, then save the modifications directly on your Confluence page.
However, this method moves away from the collaborative spirit of Confluence as you open an external app. On top of that, the file rendered on the page is a miniature version of the table that lacks any form of display option.
Note: On Cloud, you won’t be able to edit files using the Companion app after 31 March 2022 as Atlassian will remove the app from its Cloud platform.
Choosing the Confluence Office connector
If you do not use the companion app, you have the option of using a browser depending on your office version (see Office connector documentation) to edit an Office document attached to a Confluence page.
Simply go into the page attachments list, and you should see an Edit in Office button beside the attachment you want to edit.
This is another simple option but again lacks any kind of collaborative spirit or display properties to make your table enjoyable to use and read by your team.
Using an external plugin like Elements Spreadsheet
At Elements, we found those options were too limited and curbed our productivity. That is why we created Elements Spreadsheet, a simple Confluence plugin that allows you to transfer your data from Excel to Confluence in a few clicks.
The plugin allows you to display dynamic tables seamlessly in Confluence. It uses native Confluence features like user mentions and dates, support formulas, data filtering, dropdown lists and is fully compatible with your Excel files.
To have a glance at how well the app can integrate with your team processes, you can check some of our detailed use-cases:
- Configure a pricing calculator for your sales proposal
- Manage your events organization directly in Confluence
Import an Excel file into Confluence using Elements Spreadsheet
How your Excel sheets are rendered is often just as important as the content. Here are our top tips and best practices in order to make the import process smooth and ensure your data is presented in a clear way.
Best practices for preparing your Excel document before importing it into Confluence
These general guidelines will help ensure that your table will be as close to the original as possible when importing it to Elements Spreadsheet for Confluence.
- Apply the correct data format: For instance, be sure your date cells are in the date format. This way they will match the native Confluence dates aspect after the import.
- Format your data as a table in Excel if you want your rows to display alternating row colors. The app will detect it automatically and apply alternating row colors to the corresponding area.
- Make sure to not have an empty first row, and that the first row is your header row with names for the data in the corresponding column.
Importing your Excel spreadsheet into Confluence
Now that your data is prepared, let’s look at how to import it in a few simple steps using Elements Spreadsheet:
Go to your Confluence page where you want to import your Excel file and insert the Spreadsheet macro.
Select “Import file” and click on the “Browse” button to select your Excel document on your computer.
Once your file is selected. Simply click on the “Ok” button to import your document.
Note: To be available on your Confluence page, you have to save your imported document in the editor (even if you don’t edit it).
That’s it, you’ve pulled your Excel spreadsheet into Confluence. Let’s now see how to optimize the way it’s rendered.
Display options for your Elements Spreadsheet documents
When the page is in edit mode, simply click on the Spreadsheet macro. You have 3 sets of buttons popping up at the bottom:
- Edit to configure the advanced rendering options.
- Shortcuts to adjust the width of your table in display mode: Centered, Wide, or Full Width.
- Delete to remove the table from the page.
If you click on Edit, a pop-up window will appear with multiple options to configure the sheet rendering mode.
First, your Spreadsheet can be rendered in your Confluence page as a Table, in that case, it will be rendered as a standard spreadsheet inside your Confluence page.
The alternative is to render it as an Icon, in which case only a Spreadsheet App icon is displayed with the document name. This can be useful in case you have very long or large tables that you don’t want to fill your page space with. It will only display a placeholder icon and clicking on it will open the document in full-screen.
If you chose the Table mode, you can now pick if you want to:
- Display the Full Screen / Edit / Export buttons when the Confluence page is in display mode.
- Have the table width match the edit mode width, or always fill all the section available space.
- View all the sheets and navigate between them by clicking on the different tabs, or displaying some selected tabs only. This allows you to hide tabs with less useful information relative to the context of the page and control what you want your team to get out of the table.
An embedded spreadsheet fully integrated into your Confluence page
Spreadsheets are an integral part of today’s project work and they shouldn’t be isolated from the wiki information. By pulling Excel data inside Confluence with Elements Spreadsheet, you’re able to offer a seamless experience with all the information centralized in Confluence.
If you want to see what else you can do with Elements Spreadsheet, be sure to check out our documentation.
Interested in trying the app?
Trello, Bitbucket, Opsgenie: you’re probably familiar with tools from the Atlassian suite, but today we’ll take a deeper look at the using Jira and Confluence together. Confluence is great for working on content, and Jira is built for task tracking, but together they provide even more help to your team. If your team is only working with Jira or just with Confluence, you might wonder how you can use them together. We’ll take a closer look at 8 ways you can use Jira and Confluence together and bring out the best in the tools and your team.
Using Jira and Confluence together
Integrate tools to centralize organizational data, avoiding scattered files and emails. Jira and Confluence streamline management for various content types.This integration is supported by a variety of templates that make setup quick and easy, enhancing both Confluence and Jira practices.
Benefits of using Jira and Confluence together
- Enhanced Cross-Team Communication: Linking Jira to Confluence ensures that technical details housed in Jira are readily accessible to teams operating within Confluence. This connectivity not only simplifies access but also fosters collaboration across technical and non-technical groups. According to Atlassian, “66% of Jira software customers who use confluence said that it helped them to boost communication between development and non-technical teams.”
- Increased Speed of Delivery: By replacing other documentation tools like SharePoint or Google Docs with Confluence, teams using Jira can accelerate project execution. Seamless access to necessary documentation within Confluence allows software development teams to operate more efficiently. According to Atlassian, “76% of Jira Software customers said they shipped projects faster after adding Confluence.”
- Improved Reporting for Business Teams: Jira’s robust reporting capabilities are well-utilized by developers and project managers who track progress with tools like sprint burn-down charts and status pie charts. By integrating these reporting features into Confluence, business teams gain easier access to critical data without needing to navigate complex interfaces, thus making strategic information more accessible and actionable.
How to use confluence and Jira together
Here are eight practical ways to integrate Confluence and Jira to enhance team collaboration. These examples will demonstrate how using these tools in tandem can streamline communication, accelerate project delivery, and strengthen team unity.
Example 1: Displaying Jira issues on a Confluence page
Confluence enables you to showcase details from Jira issues. You have the option to display individual issues, an issue count (based on a filter), or a table (also based on a filter). When you opt to display Jira issues in a table format on Confluence, you can tailor the display settings and select the specific data you wish to view and its arrangement, including the issue key, summary, due date, assignee, etc. By integrating Jira issues individually or via a filter onto a Confluence page, tasks are visible alongside related notes or project documentation. No jumping back and forth between tools!
Example 2: Create reports with Jira Charts
Enhance your retrospective pages or end-of-quarter reports by incorporating Jira Charts into your Confluence pages. This visual integration allows for impactful presentations and comprehensive data analysis.
Jira Charts will assist you in emphasizing essential data from Jira and sharing your findings within context by embedding them alongside explanations, useful macros, and supporting images or illustrations.
Example 3: Publish your Jira Roadmap to Confluence
Showcase your Jira roadmap on Confluence to provide all departments with access, allowing them to visualize team progress and enhance transparency regarding your product roadmap.
Embed your roadmap in Confluence for a comprehensive view while adding notes, wireframes, or other essential team information.
Discover how to maximize the use of Jira and Confluence with Elements Publish.
Example 4: Add a shortcut to a Jira project on Confluence
Integrate a direct link from a Confluence space to one or more Jira projects to facilitate quicker navigation. This Jira Confluence integration allows users to access the relevant Jira project directly from the Confluence space they are using, reducing the number of clicks required.
If your Jira instance hosts dozens or hundreds of projects, this shortcut will be highly valued by your users.
Example 5: Create issues directly from Confluence
Enhance your workflow with the ability to create Jira issues directly within Confluence. Highlight, select the issue type, and choose the project to create it.
This seamless Jira Confluence integration is ideal for those collaborating on Confluence pages that list tasks, product requirements, or bugs, allowing for swift conversion into Jira tasks. This feature streamlines processes, making it a best practice in Confluence integrations.
Example 6: Add links to Confluence pages from an issue
As your use of Confluence expands, navigating the increasing number of spaces and pages can become challenging for team members.
By implementing a direct link from a Jira issue to a related Confluence page, you facilitate easy access to additional information, reference materials, or relevant documents for anyone working on the issue. This Jira and Confluence integration ensures that team members can contribute effectively to the correct documents, enhancing productivity and ensuring continuity across platforms.
Example 7: Access Confluence project pages directly from Jira Software
When working within Jira Software, accessing relevant Confluence pages doesn’t require switching platforms. You can explore existing project pages directly from your Jira Software project thanks to the seamless Jira Confluence integration. Additionally, when you link your Jira Software project to a Confluence workspace, you can easily create a new, empty page. This integration enhances efficiency by allowing continuous access between Jira and Confluence, streamlining workflow and improving project management practices.
Similarly, you can compose a public Knowledge Base article directly from a request by enabling this feature in JSM.
Example 8: Publish issue data to Confluence
Want to turn your Jira issue into a Confluence page? Or include certain issue data on a page without having to copy & paste each field or download and re-add attachments? What about archiving an incident for a post-mortem? You can publish issue data, including attachments and labels, to a Confluence page with the Cloud app Elements Publish.
If you are on Data Center the on premise version of Elements Copy & Sync allows you to create Confluence pages with issue data.
Get your team using Jira and Confluence together
Enhance cross-team communication, accelerate project delivery, and streamline information retrieval by integrating Jira and Confluence. If you want to go further into the Jira and Confluence integration, check out the guides provided by Atlassian on using Confluence with Jira Software or Confluence with Jira Service Management. To learn more about publishing issue data to Confluence pages, check out our walk through of Elements Publish.
Jira and Confluence have probably come across your radar if you’re looking to help your company move beyond an old system like managing requests by email or passing around Word documents. You want to change the culture to be more agile, to use modern techniques for workflow management and project management. Both Jira and Confluence are great to keep track of what you are working on, the status of them, and for your stakeholders to get an at-a-glance update.
But why should you use one over the other? Or should you use both Jira and Confluence? Let’s cover the basic differences and similarities of the tools and explain why and how your team should use them.
What this guide covers
What is the difference between Jira and Confluence?
Jira is a task management solution that allows you to track and manage issues throughout the lifecycle of each task. Jira can help with everything from software development to incident management or even HR processes, whereas Confluence is a wiki-based content management tool that allows you create and organize information collaboratively. Organizations commonly use Confluence for knowledge bases, product documentation, or intranets. Both are inspired by agile methodologies and are built around collaboration, but where Jira is great at tracking the status of individual tasks in standardized views, Confluence is great at bringing broader information together with an emphasis on visual presentation and creativity.
Let’s take a quick look at the major features of Jira and Confluence.
Features
Jira
Jira comes in a 3 main flavors: Jira Software, Jira Service Management, and Jira Work Management. They all share core components and logic and allow you track issues, but each is geared towards specific needs or teams.
Jira Software: Powerful and flexible, Jira Software is built for software teams using agile methodologies, and includes functionalities for sprint planning, bug tracking, and release management. Jira Software allows you to track affect and fix versions, plan epics and user stories, and analyze your sprint burn down.
Jira Service Management: The ITSM solution from Atlassian, Jira Service Management is a support desk for customers or employees to raise requests. Agents can then manage requests in queues and make sure everyone gets the help they need. JSM provides out of the box configurations for IT service management like service requests, incident management, and change management, but can also be used for facilities management, HR, or even legal teams that need to manage incoming requests.
Jira Work Management: Jira made for business teams: Jira Work Management includes calendar views, Excel-like list views, and basic forms so business teams like marketing, HR, or sales can track tasks in Jira with features adapted to their needs. JWM is only offered on Cloud, though on premise users have a similar experience with Jira Core.
Confluence
Confluence provides your organization a place to organize ideas, content, and files for all your activities. Since Confluence takes care of version control, you can treat it as your one source of truth and rest assured it will always be the up to date version. Favorite features include the search power, content organization and permission management, and the easy WYSIWYG editor.
Limitations
Jira: If you are looking for more traditional project management software, perhaps that includes project cost tracking, Jira wasn’t built for that (although there are apps on the Marketplace to add that kind of functionality). Jira is really good at tracking and reporting on individual tasks, but for a broader vision of a project or version planning, it’s better to work in Confluence.
Confluence: Confluence does include the possibility to assign tasks, but tasks are either “To do” or “Done”. If you need to keep track of a more complex workflow, Jira is a better option. Similarly, if you need to track how much time was spent on a task, Jira is a better option than Confluence.
Pricing
Atlassian sets the price of both tools based on the number of users and is digressive, but Jira is a bit more expensive per user. You can adjust how many users have access to each tool so you only pay for what you need. Jira Service Management pricing is different because it’s based on the number of agents replying to requests (customers or employees creating the requests are free).
Get an estimate for how much it would cost your organization with the Atlassian Cloud pricing calculator
Don’t forget to budget for apps so you can customize Jira and Confluence for the specific needs of your organization.
Jira vs. Confluence: Comparison Chart
Cloud versions
| Feature | Jira | Confluence |
|---|---|---|
| Assigning tasks |  | |
| Workflow management | |  |
| Personal dashboard | | |
| Templates | | |
| Support desk | | |
| Knowledge management | | |
| Access control/permissions | | |
| Collaborating/commenting | | |
| Roadmap planning | Very detailed | Basic |
| Project management | | |
| Calendar view of tasks | Jira Work Management only | |
| External app integrations (AD, CRM, Google Drive…) | with apps | with apps |
| Time tracking | | |
| Native reporting | | Premium only |
Why use Jira and Confluence together?
By using Jira and Confluence together, you benefit from their complementarity: Jira to keep track of distinct tasks individuals need to work on, and Confluence share and organize all of the ideas, content, and files you collaborate on with your colleagues.
Single source of truth
By using collaborative tools that allow everyone on your team to create, update, and share information in real time, you’ll be able to treat Jira and Confluence as your single source of truth. Whether you need to know which bug fixes are in QA review, where the most up to date documentation pages are, or the roadmap for the marketing team, Jira and Confluence allow everyone to access the same information.
Break down communication barriers
Software developers may spend more time in Jira, and business teams more time in Confluence, but by integrating the tools, everyone can access the information they need from the rest of your organization. Instead of information siloed by team, everyone can access what they need. Imagine the flow of ideas when UX designers, Product managers, and Marketing can work from the same page, instead of sharing each update or comment separately.
Improve efficiency
When requirements are listed in Confluence, and linked to Jira issues, and those issues also link to product documentation in Confluence, there’s no searching for information or struggling to make tools talk to each other. Teams that use Jira and Confluence together are more efficient because they spend less time keeping track of work and more time on the work.
How to integrate Jira and Confluence
For Cloud users, integrating Jira and Confluence is automatic as soon as you have both products on the same site. If you only have Jira or Confluence, you can add another product is just a few steps:
Step 1: Open the Settings menu from next to your user icon on the top right of Jira or Confluence, and select Billing.
Step 2: Once in your Atlassian Admin, click on Products in the top menu (between Directory and Security).
Step 3: You will see the products you currently have. Click on “Add Product” and follow the set up wizard to add the additional product to your site.
If you are using Jira or Confluence on premise (Server or Data Center hosting), you will need to go to 
> General Configuration > Application links, Enter the URL of the application you want to link to, and configure with OAuth (with impersonation) authentication. Read Atlassian documentation for more details.
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✅ Check out our guide on how to integrate Jira and Confluence
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How to use Jira and Confluence together
A picture’s better than a thousand words, right? So here are two examples of how to use Jira and Confluence together for project management or requirements management.
Confluence and Jira for project management
Let’s take an example project you might be familiar with: migrating applications.
Many teams will start off with kick-off planning in Confluence, where you can take advantage of page templates like Project Plan, Meeting Notes, or DACI, tag everyone involved in the meeting, and start noting tasks, deadlines, and action items.
From there, you can create Jira issues for the tasks and assign them. If you are the Project Manager, you can track and share progress of the various tasks by using a filter to display all the issues related to the project on a Confluence page.
As the migration project continues, the team can use Confluence for functional specifications, technical documentation, and feedback on the migrated tool, with everyone on the team able to see, comment, and collaborate on those documents. Any files or assets needed can be added to each page, so team members don’t have to remember where to look on a shared drive. If configurations or features need to be reviewed once the application has been migrated, you can use a ‘Review’ status in your Jira workflow and assign the issue to a team member.
Jira and Confluence for requirements management
Create, share, get feedback, update, rinse and repeat: Jira and Confluence are the agile solution to requirements management throughout the life of your product development.
Confluence ships with a blueprint, or template, for requirements management, so you can get started right out of the gate. You can then solicit feedback and comments from multiple stakeholders, who can either comment the text directly, comment the page, or update it themselves (you can always check the page history to see the changes).
If you have customer interviews or other research that is useful background information, you can link those pages directly from your requirements management page.
As the requirements are detailed, you can start creating User Stories for them in Jira directly from Confluence by highlighting the text.
If you need to include wireframes, mockups, or prototypes on a Confluence page, there are multiple apps that allow you to do that so everyone can keep all your work together. Team members can even comment mock ups just like text or other images.
Confluence automatically creates a page summarizing the main details from all your requirements management pages if you use the blueprint, so you can see at a glance the progress of all your different projects.
Get your team on Jira and Confluence
You want an agile, modern solution for your team, and Jira and Confluence provide that. By using them together, you’ll get the most out of both tools and see the benefits: a single source of truth, breaking down communication barriers between teams, and improved efficiency. The whole really is more than the sum of the parts! Curious to learn some concrete examples of the different ways you can use Jira and Confluence together?