U.S. Government Agency Streamlines Reporting for Real-Time Visibility with Atlassian Tools

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science sought Praecipio’s expertise in the early stages of their Exascale Computing Project (ECP), a pivotal initiative to maintain the United States' leadership in supercomputing. The project’s ambitious goal was to develop the world's next supercomputer with a capability of 1 Teraflop. Recognizing the complexity of this challenge, the DOE Office of Science turned to Praecipio's strategic approach for aggregating real time data and optimizing their use of Atlassian tools and IT and SDLC processes.

Praecipio provided essential guidance on best practices and assisted in configuring EazyBI for advanced analytics and increased visibility within Jira Software, a critical component for tracking the project's progress against its scope, schedule, and cost objectives. By integrating real time data from three different sources, including Jira Software, EazyBI helped the ECP team gain up to date information so they could establishing a baseline schedule for the project within a tight timeframe.

This collaboration supported the DOE’s mission to spearhead advancements in supercomputing. It demonstrated how strategic partnerships and advanced tool configurations can propel such significant projects toward achieving their milestones, reinforcing the United States’ competitive edge in technological innovation.

The Exascale Computing Project (ECP) had a defined end date and was distributed across National Labs, Universities, and outside vendors and contractors, which made it difficult to enforce standards for the Atlassian tools. In addition, the Application Development and Software Technology structures wanted to implement agile methodologies, while the project was slated to follow a traditional waterfall methodology for project management. 

Through interviews with users and administrators and deep dives into Jira data and EazyBI dashboards, we quickly realized that the data structures in Jira Software and the additional applications in place relied heavily on manually processes. This resulted in EazyBI using significant additional processing power to create data cubes for reporting. Finally, the team relied on an Excel workbook converted to CSV to aggregate data from Primavera and the cost accounting system to the tune of 60,000 lines of additional data to report Earned Value and Actual Cost. 

While the Jira instance was relatively small (<10,000 Issues), it was the source of truth for work completion relating back to two other systems. This was then translated into performance metrics shared with the Department of Energy. In short, real time visibility into the data was crucial for work execution and performance tracking.

Praecipio proposed a two-week IT and SDLC process assessment to address the team’s concerns and advise them on next steps. We analyzed the client’s Atlassian stack to develop a holistic, custom approach for establishing best practices and providing real time data with their tools. 

Our process assessment examined Jira Software, Jira Service Management, and Confluence, as well as the additional data provided by other systems, to determine where operational efficiency could be improved. We presented recommendations that, if implemented, would improve ECP’s reporting capabilities specific to project progress and success.

We presented our final recommendations on Day 9 of 10 to allow feedback from ECP. Because of the organization's complicated nature and the hard end date of this specific effort, several nuances had to be incorporated to ensure we were giving the right recommendations.

After the assessment, the Exascale Computing Project team was able to establish a clear path forward in evaluating the EazyBI tool and its capabilities to support their very distinct and complex business reporting and forecasting process. 

The Department of Energy (DOE) has experienced significant improvements in operational efficiency and data-driven decision-making, with valuable insights that enable quicker, more accurate business decisions. Through this enhanced reporting visibility, the DOE has not only experienced significant cost savings, but also shifted its focus toward impact-driven initiatives. 

This transformation has provided significant benefits to the DEO, allowing the department to allocate resources more strategically, ensuring efforts are concentrated where they can generate the most positive outcomes. Real time data gives them the ability to rapidly assess and respond to new information, which has fostered a culture of agility and precision. This gives the DOE a competitive edge in implementing the Exascale computing project efficiently. This underscores the critical role that reporting and end to end visibility play in modern organizational success.