The Group By functionality on the Program Board enables users to organize work items into customized, concise views based on different criteria. This functionality offers multiple grouping options, providing tailored perspectives on work items, statuses, card types, and more. Below are the available Group By options accessible at the top of your Program Board.
Features
Card Type
Status Category
Responsible (Features)
Responsible (Stories)
Azure DevOps Fields
Area Path
Parent-Epic (Epic)
Project
Selected Custom Fields (Enabled on the Edit Board Settings -> Projects)
1. Example: Group by "Parent-Epic" (Parent of Feature)
This new grouping functionality on the Program Board organizes planned features by various criteria to enhance clarity and focus. Let’s begin with the “Parent-Epic” grouping: when selected, the Board will arrange features as follows:
The Program Board displays distinct sections for each "Parent-Epic" within each team, organizing items into their respective categories.
Expanding the Epicn name reveals all features within that type, with further expansion displaying stories associated with the features. The dependencies between features or stories are also displayed in expanded view.
Each bar displays key details for easy reference, including the Estimate (Sum of Story Points), Sprint name, Dependency count, and a Status-wise item count showing the number of items in each status.
2. Grouping Criteria Options
The other group by options displays the respective information in a similar pattern. Below table illustrates the outcome details of all the Group By options at the Program Board:
Group By | Details |
Feature | Features planned by each team are displayed in the same order as they appear on the Backlog.
If a feature is being worked on by multiple teams, it will appear under each team, but only the stories specific to each team will be shown in their respective sprint areas. |
Status Category | Sections for status categories (To Do, In-Progress, Done) |
Responsible (Feature) | Sections for the Responsible person of the Feature as set in Azure DevOps. Regardless of whether the responsible person is in Kendis or not, the value is retrieved from the feature details in Azure DevOps. |
Responsible (Stories/PBIs) | Sections by Responsible, with all stories assigned to each team member. Similar to above section, the value is retrieved from Azure DevOps |
Azure DevOps Fields | Project, Area Path, and Parent-Epic are default fields. However, if additional fields are configured under project settings in Kendis, they will also appear in this list. More details are provided below. |
2.2 Azure DevOps Fields
In Azure DevOps boards, specific fields like ADO Project, Area Path, and Parent-Epic are automatically available in the Group By dropdown as predefined Azure DevOps fields. If more fields are selected from Azure DevOps, they will appear here. To set more fields
Go to Board Settings -> Edit Board Settings
Azure DevOps Projects -> Project Name -> Additional Fields
3. Team Area View
Grouping options are accessible within the Team view, allowing organizations to see features and stories organized by the selected criteria.
During Quarterly Planning sessions, a helpful grouping option is to view stories by assignee.
In the Team Area, additional insights are uniquely available here:
Team Capacity: Defined manually or within the Team Capacity planning section.
Load: Total Story Points of all stories within each Sprint.
Committed Load: A baseline of the total Story Points set at the start of the Sprint.
The Grouping options are available under Team view. This enables organizations to view the features and stories planned by above selected criteria.
A valuable group by option during the Quarterly Planning session would be to view the stories by assignee.
In the Team Area, there are additional information which is only visible here
Team Capacity: Set manually or set at Team Capacity planning area
Load: Sum of Story Points of stories in each Sprint
Committed Load: A baseline taken at the start of the Sprint for total sum of Story Points
