Learn how user insights and data helped transform Smart Values into a game-changing feature at Atlassian.
How we used user feedback and support data to prioritize smart values enhancements at Atlassian.
As designers, we spend a lot of our time understanding and solving user problems, constantly striving to enhance the UX of our products. However, in today’s competitive environment, solving these problems isn’t enough – we also need to effectively communicate them to stakeholders and leadership in ways that resonate with their priorities. Without their buy-in, even the best solutions may never be implemented.
This is the story of how I transformed user insights into a compelling case for action, securing the support needed to improve a core experience in our product.
Meet smart values
I joined the Automation team at the end of 2023. Atlassian’s Automation is a no-code tool that lets users create custom rules to automate and streamline tasks across Jira and Confluence.. The first piece of work I took on was a user research project. After speaking to customers, I identified a handful of themes that needed to be addressed to improve the experience of building automations – one of which was the issue users were having with smart values.
If you’ve used Atlassian’s Automation, you’re likely familiar with smart values. If not, here’s a quick overview: Smart values are dynamic placeholders used to access and manipulate data within automation rules. They allow you to reference issue fields, user information, dates, and other contextual details, enabling more flexible and customized automation actions.
Here are some real-life examples:
Accessing issue fields: If you want to include the issue summary in an automated message or notification, use {{issue.summary}}. This smart value dynamically pulls in the issue’s title, making your message more informative without needing manual updates.
Referencing assignee information: To personalize notifications or updates by including the assignee’s name, use {{issue.assignee.displayName}}. This smart value is especially helpful in comments, emails, or messages to ensure that the correct person knows they’re responsible for the issue.
The problem – Smart values are too smart
While smart values are extremely powerful, they were the number one item that customers struggled with. Our research revealed several key themes:
- Everybody struggles with smart values: Smart values posed challenges for users across all technical backgrounds. Every customer expressed frustration with them, with most identifying this as their biggest obstacle to adopting and utilizing automations.
- There’s a lack of in-product help: Users expected in-app guides and libraries, and nearly all users were frustrated by having to leave Jira and Confluence to find help with smart values. Users consistently questioned the absence of in-app guidance or documentation.
- There’s very little reassurance from the product: Users lacked confidence that their smart values would work, citing insufficient guidance and validation as key issues.
The other problem: getting smart values prioritized
As a newcomer to the team, the aforementioned issues were fresh to me, and the evidence seemed compelling – we needed to address the challenges customers faced with smart values to improve both the experience and adoption of Automation.
When I presented my research insights to stakeholders, it became clear that the team was already aware of these challenges. However, given the scope of other critical projects, prioritizing improvements to smart values had been difficult. I realized that simply sharing the research wasn’t enough – I needed to connect the insights to strategic business outcomes to bring this issue to the forefront.
Collaborating across crafts
At Atlassian, I’m fortunate to work alongside some of the most brilliant people I’ve encountered in my career. Rebecca Smith (Bec), is a Principal Product Engineer who, at the time, worked closely with the support team and had a strong customer focus. Collaborating with Bec allowed me to bridge the gap between user feedback and business impact in a meaningful way. Together, we explored how smart values were affecting the support team, and Bec’s analysis revealed that over 10% of Automation support tickets were tied to this issue. Our partnership not only helped us quantify the problem but also demonstrated how cross-functional collaboration can drive impactful solutions.
Tying the problem to money
Bec and I believed that quantifying the support effort would help the leadership team understand the problem better. Together, we came up with the below metric to help us calculate the estimated cost to Atlassian:
Of course, this isn’t perfect, but it’s a strong estimate, and most importantly, it shows the magnitude of the problem in a way senior leaders can relate to – By tying it to a dollar value.
We presented the estimated costs associated with smart values, which quickly led to the project being elevated to a top priority and securing funding for at least two quarters.
Solving the problem
Alongside some superstar Product and Content Designers – Swae, Olivia, and Kevin – We designed an in-app solution to enhance users’ ability to search for and discover new smart values, view examples, and seamlessly insert them into their automation. This collaborative effort ensured the solution was intuitive, engaging, and aligned with user needs. We, of course, tested our design with users and made some final adjustments before releasing it to customers.
We designed a new pattern that consolidated the extensive documentation into an in-app smart values panel. It’s searchable, has logical groupings, example outputs so users know what to expect, and allows the user to insert the selected value straight into their automation.
What happened next?
The initial release of the smart values panel was met with overwhelming enthusiasm from customers, and we also saw a significant reduction in support volume, ie. we started saving Atlassian money pretty much straight away!
I used this metric extensively in presentations and updates and to my surprise, other team members started to adopt this metric to help estimate the cost of problems and influence the leadership team.
Lessons learned
I learned a lot throughout this project:
- This project reinforced the importance of cross-functional collaboration, using data to influence decisions, and framing user problems in terms that resonate with stakeholders.
- Partnering with Engineering allowed us to quantify the business impact of user issues, turning abstract frustrations into concrete priorities.
- Additionally, leveraging data to advocate for solutions and continuously aligning user feedback with business outcomes helped secure leadership buy-in.
Ultimately, the success of the smart values panel demonstrated that user feedback drives meaningful product iteration and that persistence in advocating for the user is key to making impactful changes.
The outcome – data driving design
The shift in smart values – from a major headache to a valuable feature – shows how collaboration and data-driven advocacy can make a difference.
As designers, we’re not just here to solve problems; we also need to make sure those issues get the attention they deserve. By linking user feedback to tangible business outcomes, we can create solutions that improve our products, support our teams, and most importantly, delight our customers. I encourage all designers to find their own ways of turning user insights into actionable business impact, ensuring that our work not only solves problems but drives meaningful change within our organizations.
Passionate About Design? Join the Atlassian Design Team!