Tracking how much work a given idea will take to develop helps you prioritize and execute effectively. In Productboard, the default Effort field is used for this. (The Jira equivalent of effort is story points.)
The effort field can be used as columns on a grid, as card attributes displayed on a roadmap, as part of formulas (for instance, in a RICE score, E is for Effort), or as part of a Jira integration for a two-way story point sync.
This article describes how to work with the effort field.
In this article:
Assigning effort values to items
Effort can be assigned to the following item types:
You can edit an item's effort value by clicking it anywhere it appears in Productboard to open its details sidebar and scrolling down until you find the effort field. However, this is not the most efficient way to edit effort for more than a single item.
Instead, it's best to edit effort values by adding the effort field as a column to a board.
To display the effort field on a grid:
- Click Add columns.
- Toggle on the Effort field.
Once you have the effort column set up, you can edit an item's effort value by clicking directly on the field within the column. You can type in any number, or, if you click again while the effort field is zero, you can choose from a list of Fibonacci numbers to help you standardize your effort sizes.
Effort column behaviors
There are two types of effort behaviors: rollup and manual. The default behavior for new items is rollup, where effort value is calculated based on the effort values of an item's children.
By clicking on a rollup value, you can adjust it manually. Once you do, that effort field's behavior will change to manual, and it will no longer update automatically if the effort values of its children change.
You can right-click on a manual effort field to change its behavior back to rollup. The effort value will immediately reset.
You can tell which behavior is being used by an effort field based on the icon visible within the field. A rightward arrow indicates rollup, and is always visible. If the field displays a person, or no icon, it's manual. You can always hover over the field to see which behavior is active in that field.
Viewing effort on roadmaps
To display the effort field on most roadmaps:
- Click Card customization (or Configure) in the top right of the roadmap.
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(Timelines and columns boards only) Choose the item type you’d like to add Effort to.
- Toggle on the Effort field.
You'll see effort values appear on each item's card.
Effort in formulas and Jira
For information about using effort in formulas, see Create your own prioritization formulas on New boards.
For details on how effort in Productboard can be mapped to Jira, see Mapping fields between Jira and Productboard.