Agile Human Resource Management at Atlassian: A Review and Recommendations

This report evaluates the agile transformation of human resource management activities at Atlassian and provides recommendations for improvement. It covers talent selection, managing employees’ performance, training and coaching of employees, establishing pay structure of employees and compensation, and learning and development of employees.

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Executive Summary
The following report discussed the agile transformation of many activities of human resource
management to achieve success in today’s dynamic business environment. The following report
is based on article “HR goes Agile”. On the basis of this article, the report evaluated that the HR
activities of Atlassian are how agile and these activities are talent selection, training of
employees, learning and development of employees, establishing pay structure for employees
and managing the performance of employees. After evaluating all these activities, report
recommended some ideas to make these activities more agile. With these recommendations,
Atlassian can create more agility in all these functions of human resource management.

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Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Talent selection................................................................................................................................3
Managing employees’ performance................................................................................................4
Training and coaching of employees...............................................................................................5
Establishing pay structure of employees and compensation...........................................................6
Learning and development of employees........................................................................................6
Recommendations............................................................................................................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
References List................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
Atlassian is an Australian well-known software company. Its main function is to produce
products for software developers and project managers. Its main product is the Jira Application
which is a tracking application. Atlassian mainly has 135,000 customers who use their services.
The company was founded in 2002 by Mike Kennan Brooks and Scott Farquhar. The two
founders met at a university in Sydney and formed the pair. They both started the company with
a $ 10,000 credit card debt, but then bootstrapped the company for a few years. The name of the
company is derived from Greek mythology. From 2011 to 2014, the company re-launched its
logo, this time the logo featured a blue X-shaped figure under the sky. Jira, which is the main
product of this company, was launched by the company in 2002. Apart from Jira, some other
products of this company are Jira Confluence Hipchat, Stride Bitbucket, Bitbucket Server
Bamboo, Fisheye Crucible Trello, Atlassian Marketplace, Sourcetree Crowd, Statuspage,
OpsGenie and Jira service desk (Atlassian, 2019a).
The following report will discuss the human resource management of Atlassian. It will evaluate
the talent selection process, performance appraisal process, training, and coaching of employees,
pay structure of employees and learning and development system of employees in the context of
Atlassian Company. After evaluating these functions, the report will recommend some
improvements in HR function on the basis of article “HR goes Agile”.
Talent selection
Talent selection is an important and dynamic process to hire new employees. Requirements for
each vacancy have changed significantly with iteration which takes place. To better control the
entire process quickly and adapt to changing requirements, agile talent selection is perfect for
streamlined recruitment companies. The underlying idea of hiring the employer and the
candidate named agile is to provide great value and satisfaction for both. This can be done by
getting the right "fit" and to define a profitable and efficient time (Bdareen & Khasawneh, 2019).
Talent selection is a strategic approach to perform the general functions of human resource
management. Talent management has a huge contribution to the HR environment and all this is
the main management environment of the 21st century. HR plays a key role in the strategy of

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each company. Human resource professionals typically work closely with other company leaders
and ensure that employees are happy in the office environment and do their work with such
dedication. All the employees have contributed significantly to the growth of the company
( Klippert, 2014).
The main task of HR is to select the employees and HR selects those who can adapt themselves
according to the workplace and remain part of that office for a long time. Along with HR,
employees also have a very important contribution to the operation of any company. The
company takes a decision according to the input of its employees because the company considers
these employees as its basic assets. Due to the important role of the employees, the talent
selection mechanism should be consistent and accurate and human resources should select those
who are perfect for this office and can contribute to the development. They may track positions
dependent on the amount and skills of staff required to develop the interview and screening
process for greater accuracy (Kiser, 2011).
The agile talent selection process of Atlassian begins with LinkedIn to check the pool of global
talent. With the help of talent pool reports of LinkedIn, the recruiters of Atlassian can pinpoint
markets where the demand for supply exceeds. After this, the company focuses on recruiter
outreach and campaigns of online branding. To recruit people, Atlassian uses its website and its
process is also depending on technology.
Atlassian provides an option of a career on the official website of the company and gives the
opportunity to all those people who want to make career in the Atlassian. People can apply on
the website and company chooses the best resumes and follows the next process. To recruit
employees, Atlassian uses agile process because the mission of company is to give the potential
to every team of company and company thinks that people perform best in the team and when
teams are drive then every team performs well. This is the unique contribution of all such
Atlassian's enhances the success of company, and company is committed to building a culture in
a company where everyone gets useful work and opportunities to be recognized for their efforts.
Finally, company is committed to providing an environment free of discrimination for all
(Atlassian, 2019b).

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Managing employees’ performance
In today's world, innovation and powerful technology have a huge place. In today’s time, these
things have a huge contribution to starting any company and adopting these things is necessary
for today's era and it is easier than ever to start a company these days. But preparing and working
with a perfect team is a challenging task even today, leaders and managers have to work very
hard to do this task but it is still the topmost task for the company. Provide best training and
development is the basic priniciple of the company to adopt agile processes. Many companies
have adopted many values and principles to make their products and services agile such as
learning, development and training to employees. But in today’s business environment, most of
the companies are providing best training and development to their employees and now it is
become very common in the form of agile and lean processes to improve their products and
services. Though, some enterprises are capable to apply agile principles outermost project
management (Scheuer, 2014).
Agile performance administration has a development practice instructed by combined,
continuous feedback, agile values, and processes. But, given the pace with which market
scenarios are exchanging, and the fact that workers turnover rates at tech are increasing, it has
become more than required for enterprises to innovate on the People Ops front. Today's era is an
era of communication and constant feedback, in this changing era; companies cannot review the
meeting once or twice a year and make no cuts in its report. Just as how an athlete regularly gets
coaching tricks and feedback through their training period, knowledge workers also need to
receive constant feedback to come to their full energy and potential (Panda, 2011).
While there is not any common and strict formula for creating amazing teams, experts should
also be sharing common and exciting most valuable contributions to the teams of the company.
Atlassian manages the performance of employees by yearly and half-yearly time slots. But they
follow the basic principles of the agile performance management of employees which has three
pillars of teamwork and these pillars are focus, mentoring and transparency.
Company Atlassian thinks that when a manager starts praising and appreciating their team
members for their job roles and work well done, then they become true leaders. To give coaching
to the employees or encourage them, the manager is seeing themselves as a personal trainer to

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remove the barriers and improve their skills. To make improvements in every work, managers
are continuously taking feedback from the employees.
Training and coaching of employees
The companies which want to adopt the most effective practices of agile talent, that companies
investing in the coaching skills to sharpening the managers. Give proper training and coaching to
the employees is an essential work of managers. To succeed in each team, employees need to be
trained. New team members to adjust to the ongoing operational changes, or to ensure that
everyone is on the same page, a good training program, which integrates the team and worked
well together. Training is an investment in a team that affects not only individuals but also the
trading floor (Srimannarayana, 2011).
Like Agile project management leaves the only IT field and now it is popular in industries and
other company departments, many more leaders thinking that project types may have to apply to
their groups and teams. From departments to marketing consulting firms, industries are
becoming increase mostly agile. The main goal of an agile coach is to improve leadership and
start that work. In any organization, all the employees below the top management level are
required to be part of this coaching process (Clarke & Higgs, 2016).
All those who participate in this coaching have to describe their roles and they are told how they
can deliver high-level products in low increments. Along with this, they are given guidelines as
to how they can fulfill the need of all the customers. The management of the organization is
generally reluctant to participate in this training as the higher-level people feel that this training
is challenging their strengths and leadership. The agile coaches who are in the organization are
considered as the mentors of the company and this coach shows the way in navigating the
company in the competitive market of this time. They guide companies in the challenges that
allow team collaboration and design programs to be implemented.
Establishing pay structure of employees and compensation
With the changing business environment, the pay structure of the employees and compensation
policies are also being adopted and being agile has become the need for the companies in each
and every sector whether it is retail or software companies. Compensation has proven to be tool

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to enforce agile values such as learning and knowledge sharing in the organization. Employees
believe in constructive growth and sharing the mutual duty to focus on constructive growth in the
organization. Compensation is more than the contribution to the team for success. This helps the
employees to understand that they are valued in the organization. Proving honest bonuses and
incentives program to the organization is the basic criterion for any organization's success
(Madhani, 2015).
The basic major elements for agile compensation policies and programs involve Transparency,
participation, and profit-sharing in goal settings of the organization. The agile approaches are
based on cooperation and collaboration among the employees and the team which makes the
organization focused in right direction (Shields, et al., 2015).
Atlassian organization has a compensation and leadership committee in place which helps the
organization to plan and organize compensation plans according to the current changing
scenarios. The companies have share-based compensation and additional products for agile
compensation plan. The company’s share-based compensation is growth-oriented which is
required by all the companies in agile environment. It is important to note that compensation
inequality within the employees can create lots of problems in the organization's overall working
and management. The common problems faced by the agile organization are changing employee
perspectives towards the compensation and reward system (Knapp, et al., 2017).
The compensation programs are the key to motivate employees in order to achieve
organizational goals and objectives. The compensation programs of Atlassian involve learning
and development methods for the leaders and directors. The director’s remuneration is linked
with performance but as a software company the management has not put any effort into making
the organization sustainable in nature which is demanded in agile business environment. In
recent trends the companies have paid compensation to all the directors on the basis of
contribution by all the directors of the company. The company also does not have any profit-
sharing plans for their employees and senior management. The company does not have any
employee engagement while any goal setting which shows the company has to work on
transparency in goal setting in compensation programs to achieve competitive edge in the long
run (Clarke & Eales-Reynolds, 2015).

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Learning and development of employees
Learning and development skills in the employees are an important factor in the growth of an
individual as well as organization. In robust technology world the skills of the employee have
become crucial day by day, it is important that the company should be updated with latest
technology as well as methods to improve company products. Being a market leader in software
company Atlassian has a robust learning and development programs for their senior management
as well as directors of the company. In agile environment all human practices are evolving and
learning plays great importance in bringing new changes in the department as well as
organization (Frederiksen, et al., 2017).
The major challenges faced by human resources in an agile environment involve resistance in
change by the employees. Learning and development help the organization to change and accept
new methods and processes in the organization. The company being software hub has knowledge
base on the website which is one of the best methods adopted in online learning. The online
learning methods which are mostly adopted by the companies are microlearning, social learning,
game learning and mobile learning which help the company programming customized learning
for the employees according to their requirement and demand (Dries, et al., 2012).
The learning and coaching skills have converted into broader aspects with introduction of
innovation in human resources management. The basic principles in learning and development
skills in agile environment involve value-focused learning, engagement of employees through
customized learning as well as collaborative methods to enhance teamwork in the organization
(Sung & Choi, 2014).
One of the major elements of Agile design in human resource learning and development is
functioning and monitoring of employees through updated technology and software, The
companies are also focusing on programs which can provide good feedback system for
employees which focus on improvement in learning and development methods, The organization
being agile in company process still need to improve the learning methods to achieve
competitive edge in the agile business environment. Human resources play a huge role in
engaging and motivation right talent in the organization. With changing time the employees’

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needs which can lead to retention in the organization are focused on growth and development of
the employee (Mihalcea, 2017).
Recommendations
Atlassian should follow the agile recruiting process which is simple and effective to achieve
success in work. First of all, the company should work in sprints. Sprints make every employee-
focused and motivated. After this, company should take weekly scrum meetings which will
create clear communication that is a base of agile methodology. Managers should ensure that
every employee is aware of the project process. Scrum task board is an important part of the
agile recruitment process and it gives an idea of current sprints. With the help of this process,
employees work very efficiently which reduces the need for new employees (Cappelli & Tavis,
2018).
To make more agile performance management, the company should take feedback from
employees on regular basis and solve their problems. To maintain the agility in performance
management, managers should set goals and objectives on quarterly pace. Transparency is also
an important factor to make agility in performance management. The days of secret periodic
reviews by managers and supervisors are gone. Traditional performance evaluations are sensitive
to many psychological biases such as hearing, corona, and horn effects. With APM, performance
appraisals have actually changed for this purpose as they are placed in the context of the work
performed.
In the context of training and coaching of employees, Atlassian should use interesting content
which can engage employees. To give effective training to the employees, Atlassian should give
training courses with the use of the right communication material. In the digital world, it is very
important use rich media in training to present the material.
The company should focus on personalizing the compensation programs according to the job
requirements which is one of the important changes which should be incorporated in the
company. This personalization helps the employees to understand and analyze the key areas
where the growth is required. The company can incorporate agile coaching and learning
techniques to improve the skills of the employees. The coaching techniques like live classes,

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interaction sessions with senior management are some of the suggestions which can be adopted
by Atlassian.
Conclusion
From the above discussion on the agile human resource management, it can be concluded that
modern time needs an agile process in human resource management because it touches every
function of the organization. In today’s dynamic environment, it is essential that companies
follow the agility in the functions of the organization. Human resource management performs
many activities such as recruitment, talent selection, establishing pay structure for employees,
give training and coaching to the employees, managing the performance of employees and many
more.
Talent selection is an essential activity of employees, in which Atlassian provides the open portal
to the individuals who want to do work in Atlassian but it is a time-consuming process. To make
agile talent selection process, company can work in sprints which will help company to save time
and resources. To manage the performance of employees, Atlassian takes feedback from the
employees on yearly and half-yearly time slot basis. But if company wants to make agile process
then company must maintain transparency and take feedback on monthly basis. Atlassian gives
proper and effective training to the employees of the company which is good for the company as
well as the employees but Atlassian should give training with interesting content to engage the
employees. The compensation programs of Atlassian involve learning and development methods
for the leaders and directors. In the context of learning and development of employees, Atlassian
gives online learning to the employees. In the end, it can be concluded that the HR functions of
Atlassian are agile but company can make these processes more agile to achieve success in this
dynamic environment.

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Available at: https://www.atlassian.com/
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