What is workload management? Strategies to improve productivity

Workload management is the process of planning, distributing, and tracking work across teams to ensure that tasks are balanced equally between team members, deadlines are achievable, and resources are used efficiently.

The ideal is that no one is underworked, overworked, or left waiting for dependencies to deliver their part. When done right, workload management helps teams prioritize effectively, anticipate bottlenecks, and keep the project scope on track.

For example, when a software development team is preparing a product release, the project manager could use workload management tools to consult schedules and assess each team member’s task load. They may notice that one developer is overloaded while another has available capacity. 

The manager can then redistribute tasks while maintaining the project timeline.

Workload management and resource management are complementary aspects of running operations. Resource planning, which entails gathering the right people and tools, has to be in place before the workload can be addressed.

• Workload management deals with “how” tasks are assigned and ensures they are prioritized and aligned with project goals.

• Resource management focuses on “what” is required to perform the work, including the staff, budgets, and materials, and ensures they are appropriately allocated to meet organizational needs.

In effect, workload management is the tactical layer that resource management tools refer to for proper execution. Together, the two concepts form a continuous loop of planning, execution, and optimization.

Teams that manage workloads effectively achieve higher productivity, greater engagement, and better results. A 2024 meta-analysis of studies by Gallup confirmed previous reports that highly engaged teams show 23% greater profitability. 

Additionally, other Gallup resources have stated that unreasonable workloads are a major factor in hampering engagement. Here’s why proper workload management matters:

• Prevents burnout: By keeping workloads balanced, managers help prevent chronic stress and fatigue.

• Boosts productivity: When tasks are clearly prioritized, teams can focus and deliver faster.

• Improves transparency: Shared workload visibility fosters collaboration and accountability.

• Enhances retention: Employees who feel supported and fairly treated are more likely to stay.

So how do workloads become skewed in the first place?

It usually happens gradually: a few urgent requests here, a change of focus there, until the balance between capacity and demand has slipped. Teams begin to stretch themselves thin and deadlines start overlapping. 

Here are a few of the common workload imbalances that can arise in this way—and how to solve them

1. Over-allocation and burnout

• Challenge: Team members take on too much work due to unclear capacity limits.

• Solution: Use capacity planning tools to visualize workloads and set maximum thresholds per person. For example, a workflow management tool might offer options like Workload Pie Chart and Resource Allocation Reports, which provide a fully transparent overview of the load distribution.

2. Shifting priorities

• Challenge: Projects evolve, and priorities can switch from one day to the next.

• Solution: Build flexibility into schedules. Use sprint planning and backlog refinement sessions to reallocate resources as priorities change.

3. Out-of-sync updates

• Challenge: Without a clear, real-time assessment of progress, bottlenecks go unnoticed until it’s too late.

• Solution: Implement dashboards in Jira to monitor workloads, progress, and deadlines. Visual reporting helps teams self-manage more effectively.

Workload management is a combination of mindset and method. It starts with the right intention—to cultivate awareness and aim for sustainable performance—coupled with structured planning, regular reviews, and the smart use of automation.

Below are ten actionable strategies, supported by Jira’s built-in tools, that will help your team stay productive and balanced.

1. Assess team availability, skills, and workload

Start by mapping out your team’s capacity and skill sets. Those are the basic building blocks of realistic planning: knowing who’s available and who’s best equipped for certain tasks.

Tools like Jira’s Capacity Planning view or a simple Confluence table can help visualize workloads. Combine this with skills mapping so tasks align with strengths, not just schedules.

Pro tip: Integrate capacity data from Confluence into Jira dashboards to track both time and expertise allocation in one place.

2. Leverage data to prioritize tasks 

Deadlines alone don’t reflect the purpose or value behind each task. Frameworks like RICE (Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort) or MoSCoW (Must, Should, Could, Won’t) help you evaluate work based on the expected measurable impact.

AI-powered prioritization tools in Jira can automatically score or reorder activities based on business expectations or their relevance to other dependencies. This removes subjective preferences from task-planning, with more of a focus on outcomes.

3. Manage your team backlog regularly to prevent task overload

Use backlog management tools to keep workloads manageable. Regular backlog grooming (or refinement) helps you review and remove outdated or duplicate tasks so the team isn’t overwhelmed by clutter.

Jira’s Backlog View automatically organizes tasks by priority and sprint, but also allows manual reorganization by dragging and dropping tasks as needed. You can filter by sprint, team capacity or assignee, and then strategically arrange the workload based on real-time context and on-the-ground knowledge.

4. Distribute work fairly based on skill sets

Use the insights from Step 1 to assign the work correctly. Jira’s Workload Distribution Reports or Resource Allocation will help you identify imbalances early and reassign tasks based on availability or expertise.

This promotes fairness based on real-time data with transparent communication, ensuring everyone operates at a sustainable pace or capacity.

5. Use visual dashboards to track workloads and project progress

Visual dashboards give teams an at-a-glance view of project health. They increase accountability, reduce ambiguity, and simplify reporting.

Jira dashboards can display everything from issue counts and burndown charts to workload heat maps. They’re particularly effective for team retrospectives, helping identify where effort is being spent and how to optimize it moving forward.

6. Automate repetitive or low-value tasks

Automation is one of the simplest ways to reclaim lost time. Identify recurring administrative operations, like updating issue statuses or sending reminders, and configure them to run automatically.

Jira’s AI Work Breakdown and AI Work Create features generate subtasks or draft issue descriptions when triggered, and can even suggest next steps. Automation frees up time for strategic work, but also helps maintain consistency across teams and projects because repetitive steps are executed the same way every time.

7. Build in regular workload reviews and feedback loops

Set recurring check-ins to discuss workloads, priorities, and blockers. These can be lightweight weekly stand-ups or monthly retrospectives, depending on your team’s rhythm.

Encourage open dialogue: ask what’s working, what isn’t, where support is needed, and what that support should look like. Over time, these conversations build trust and make workload adjustments easier to manage collaboratively.

8. Plan for flexibility when priorities shift

In agile environments, change is inevitable: priorities, customer needs, and market conditions evolve faster than any static plan can anticipate. Prepare for this by building buffer time into sprint cycles and using predictive analytics to anticipate workload spikes.

For example, Jira’s Advanced Roadmaps can model “what-if” scenarios, allowing managers to adjust workloads before issues arise or become disruptive. It’s also just as easy to create an issue—with helpful context—into the backlog so teams can understand what the work entails and its priority.

9. Track metrics to measure output and balance

To improve workload management, you need visibility into the right data. Key metrics include:

• Cycle time: How long tasks take from start to finish.

• Throughput: How many tasks are completed per period.

• Utilization rate: The percentage of time spent on productive, value-adding work.

Jira’s Dashboard Analytics or custom Confluence reports can map these results and identify trends, confirming whether your team’s performance remains healthy and sustainable.

10. Foster a culture that values sustainable performance

Finally, to instill a workload management mindset, leaders must promote the values of transparency, communication, and respect for personal capacity.

Retrospectives help employees reflect on the value of managing workload balances because they can see how careful planning and proper distribution of effort benefit everyone. 

At the same time, in cases of burnout, they can see whether this was due to bottlenecks or stretched capacity. And by dedicating time to these analyses, managers show that they have the employees’ best interests at heart.

Workload management templates can walk you through the above best practices in a standardized, repeatable way, ensuring the best outcome every time. 

Here are three purpose-built templates within the Jira ecosystem that simplify planning, tracking, and optimization for teams of all sizes.

1. Jira sprint backlog template

Perfect for agile teams, the sprint backlog template helps organize sprint work, prioritize issues, and visualize progress. Project backlogs and standard tasks can be filtered by assignee or priority, ensuring a clear picture of who’s working on what, and whether workloads are balanced.

Best for: Scrum teams needing visibility into sprint-level tasks and workloads.

2. Jira top-level planning template

For managing workload distribution across multiple projects, the top-level template provides a comprehensive overview. Managers can track overall progress, balance resources, and identify risks early, without overlap or confusion between projects.

Best for: Program or portfolio managers coordinating several projects simultaneously.

3. Jira task tracking template

Ideal for hybrid or cross-functional teams, the task-tracking template allows for granular visibility into individual workloads when ownership, progress, and dependencies need to be clearly defined. It ensures everyone knows what’s in motion and who’s responsible, aiding accurate planning and smoother coordination across complex team structures.

Best for: Teams seeking transparency and real-time insight into task progress, accountability, and blockers.

Workload management may sound like micromanagement, a term that often carries negative connotations. However, in essence, it’s a way of showing team members how they can benefit from clarity, balance, and continuous improvement.

When they can see what’s on their plate, where their time is going, and how their work connects to bigger goals, the natural response is to perform better.

With Jira, teams gain visibility into capacity and progress, can automate repetitive work, and run analytics that guide smarter decisions. Teams that combine Jira with Confluence learn how to centralize documentation, share reports, and collaborate seamlessly, creating a connected ecosystem for solid results through better planning and execution.

Use free sprint backlog template