Skip to content

SEI-13744 Update Profiles Documentation + Add Screenshots #11331

New issue

Have a question about this project? Sign up for a free GitHub account to open an issue and contact its maintainers and the community.

Sign up for GitHub

By clicking “Sign up for GitHub”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy statement. We’ll occasionally send you account related emails.

Already on GitHub? Sign in to your account

Merged
merged 2 commits into from
Sep 5, 2025
Merged

SEI-13744 Update Profiles Documentation + Add Screenshots #11331

Show file tree
Hide file tree
Changes from all commits
Commits
Show all changes
2 commits
Select commit Hold shift + click to select a range
4f14c5c
SEI-13744
alai97 Aug 20, 2025
b4713e2
Replace Screenshots
alai97 Sep 4, 2025
File filter

Filter by extension

Filter by extension
Conversations
Failed to load comments.
Loading
Jump to
Jump to file
Failed to load files.
Loading
Diff view
Diff view
118 changes: 72 additions & 46 deletions ...ing-insights/harness-sei/setup-sei/setup-profiles/business-alignment-profile.md
View file
Open in desktop
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -5,48 +5,96 @@ sidebar_label: Business Alignment profile
sidebar_position: 3
---

The Business Alignment profile defines the structure for tracking how engineering work aligns with business priorities. It establishes the investment categories to be used across the organization and specifies the scope and rules for fetching work items relevant to Business Alignment metrics.
## Overview

At the profile level, you:
A Business Alignment profile defines the structure for tracking how engineering work aligns with business priorities. It establishes the investment categories to be used across the organization and specifies the scope and rules for fetching work items relevant to Business Alignment metrics.

At the profile level, you can:

* Define the set of Investment Categories (e.g., Features, Tech Debt, Customer Commitments).
* Configure the fetch scope to determine which work items should be considered for each category (e.g., by project, integration, or work type).

The actual definition of each category i.e., how work is classified into these categories is handled by engineering managers at the team level in Team Settings, using Filter Sets based on metadata such as labels, issue types, components etc
Investment Categories represent the different strategic areas where engineering effort is invested. These categories are defined at the profile level and shared across all teams. However, each team can define its own logic for classifying work items into these categories using metadata-based filters (Filter Sets) like labels, issue types, and components in **Team Settings**.

Common examples include:

* Feature Development
* Technical Debt
* Customer Commitments
* Maintenance
* Bugs or Incidents

This two-level setup ensures consistency in reporting across the organization while giving teams the flexibility to define category logic that reflects their specific context.

## Set up the profile

To create a business alignment profile:

This two-level setup ensures consistency in reporting across the organization while allowing teams the flexibility to define category logic that reflects their specific context.
1. In your **Harness project**, navigate to **Software Engineering Insights** and click **Account Management**.
1. Under **Profiles**, select **Business Alignment**.

## Important concepts
1. To create a profile, click **Create**. To edit an existing profile, click the **Edit Profile** icon in the profiles list.

### Investment categories
1. Enter a name and add an optional description for the profile.

Investment Categories represent the different strategic areas where engineering effort is invested. Common examples include:
![](../../static/ba-profile-1.png)

* **Feature Development**
* **Technical Debt**
* **Customer Commitments**
* **Maintenance**
* **Bugs or Incidents**
1. Define and rank investment categories your organization wants to track.

These categories are defined at the profile level and shared across all teams. However, each team can define its own logic to classify work items into these categories using metadata-based filters in **Team Settings**.
![](../../static/ba-profile-2.png)

* In the **Scope of fetching tickets** section, select the relevant scope type and apply filters to narrow the computation scope. For advanced configuration, see [Scoping of fetching tickets](#scope-of-fetching-tickets).
* To edit an investment category, click the **Edit Category** icon.
* To delete an investment category, click the **Delete** icon.

### Scope of fetching tickets

Each Investment Category in the Business Alignment profile defines how tickets should be fetched based on specific criteria and hierarchy rules. This ensures that effort is correctly attributed even in nested work structures like epics, stories, and sub-tasks.

You can choose from two high-level modes:
![](../../static/ba-profile-3.png)

You have two options:

* **Fetch tickets that match the specified conditions:** Only the tickets that directly match the condition will be included.
* **Fetch tickets based on the specified conditions and also sub-tickets:** Allows for advanced selection based on parent-child relationships.
* **Fetch tickets that match the specified conditions:** Only tickets that directly match the conditions are included.
* **Fetch tickets based on the specified conditions and also sub-tickets:** Includes tickets that match the conditions *and* their related sub-tickets.

#### Advanced selection options

When using hierarchical fetching, you can choose from the following advanced options:
If you select **Fetch tickets based on the specified conditions and also sub-tickets** (hierarchical fetching), you can select from the following options:

import Tabs from '@theme/Tabs';
import TabItem from '@theme/TabItem';

<Tabs>
<TabItem value="parents" label="Parent + All Descendents">

![](../../static/ba-profile-4.png)

**All tickets and all descendents where the condition matches with the parent ticket:** Includes the parent ticket and all levels of child tickets (e.g., epics to stories to sub-tasks).

</TabItem>
<TabItem value="leafs" label="Leaf Descendents Only">

![](../../static/ba-profile-5.png)

* **All tickets and all descendents where the condition matches with the parent ticket:** Includes the parent ticket and all levels of child tickets (e.g., epics → stories → sub-tasks).
* **Only leaf descendents of tickets where the condition matches with the parent ticket:** Includes only the terminal (leaf) child tickets from matched parent tickets. Useful when work is primarily tracked at the leaf level.
* **All tickets and all descendents for an epic:** Includes all work items under an epic, regardless of whether the epic itself meets the condition.
* **All tickets and immediate children where the condition matches with the parent ticket:** Includes the matched parent ticket and its immediate children (but not deeper levels).
**Only leaf descendents of tickets where the condition matches with the parent ticket:** Includes only the terminal (leaf) child tickets from matched parent tickets. Useful when work is primarily tracked at the leaf level.

</TabItem>
<TabItem value="epic" label="Epic + All Descendents">

![](../../static/ba-profile-6.png)

**All tickets and all descendents for an epic:** Includes all work items under an epic, regardless of whether the epic itself meets the condition.

</TabItem>
<TabItem value="children" label="Parent + Immediate Children">

![](../../static/ba-profile-7.png)

**All tickets and immediate children where the condition matches with the parent ticket:** Includes the matched parent ticket and its immediate children (but not deeper levels).

</TabItem>
</Tabs>

This granularity gives teams flexibility to define fetching logic that aligns with how work is structured and tracked in systems like Jira or Azure Boards, ensuring accurate effort attribution across complex ticket hierarchies.

Expand All @@ -65,32 +113,10 @@ The ranking of categories plays a significant role in determining how tickets ar
4. **Ranking Categories:** This is where the ranking of categories comes into play. When a ticket is eligible for multiple categories, the ranking helps determine which category takes precedence or priority. In the provided example:
1. If `Category 1` is ranked higher (e.g., ranked 1), then Ticket 2 will also be allocated to `Category 1 `
2. If `Category 2` is ranked higher, then Ticket 2 will be allocated to `Category 2` and it won't be included in `Category 1`
5. **Allocation Goals and Calculations:** After tickets are allocated to Categories, you can set Allocation Goals for each Category. To learn more, Go to [Allocation Goals](#allocation-goals).
5. **Allocation Goals and Calculations:** After tickets are allocated to Categories, you can set Allocation Goals for each Category. To learn more, see [Allocation Goals](#allocation-goals).
6. **Business Alignment Calculations:** Once Allocation goals are set, Harness SEI calculates the Business Alignment metric value based on the actual allocation of tickets to categories and the progress made in each category.

</details>

## Set up the Business Alignment profile

To create a Business Alignment profile:

* In your **Harness project**, go to the SEI module.
* Navigate to **Account Management > Profiles**.
* Select the **Business Alignment** tab under the profiles section.
* Click **+ Business Alignment Profile**.
* Enter a Name for the profile and optional description.
* Under **Investment Categories**:
* Add each category your organization wants to track.
* Set the **ranking order** for the investment categories.
* Under **Scope of fetching tickets** choose the relevant **issue types** and apply filters to narrow the computation scope.
* Click **Save**.

Once saved, the Business Alignment profile must be associated with one or more Org Trees in your organization. This association determines which teams can access and use the profile.

After association, Engineering Managers within those Org Trees can define category filters at the team level, using their own set of work-item filters based on metadata such as labels, components, or issue types.

## Next steps

* Define the Business Alignment settings for a team
* View the Business Alignment dashboard
Once you have completed the profile configuration, click **Save** to finalize your changes. The Business Alignment profile must be associated with one or more [Org Trees](/docs/software-engineering-insights/harness-sei/setup-sei/setup-org-tree/) in your organization. This association determines which teams can access and use the profile.

After association, engineering managers within those Org Trees can define category filters at the team level, using their own set of work-item filters based on metadata such as labels, components, or issue types. From here, you can define Business Alignment settings for a team or view the [Business Alignment dashboard](/docs/software-engineering-insights/harness-sei/analytics-and-reporting/business-alignment).
Loading