Unifying Ways of Working with Atlassian

The Opportunity

Enervia*, New Zealand’s largest distributor of electricity and gas, is a leader in reimagining the country’s energy future. With a diverse portfolio, Enervia’s operations span the Auckland region and support over 612,000 customers. However, as the business has evolved, so has its digital landscape. Teams across Enervia were leveraging Atlassian tools, but in highly siloed and inconsistent ways.

There was no centralised or governed approach to how Jira was used. Multiple administrators with broad permissions resulted in a patchwork of workflows, naming conventions and reporting structures. This fragmentation made it nearly impossible to gain organisation-wide visibility into project progress or strategic alignment. As one internal leader described, “A project in one team meant something different in another team.” Collaboration was hampered and staff moving between teams faced a steep learning curve due to the lack of standardisation.

Enervia’s leadership recognised that to mature as a digital enterprise and fully realise the value of their Atlassian investment, they needed a unified, best practice approach to work management. The goal: to create consistent ways of working, enhance visibility and enable better decision-making across all business units.

The Solution

Elegance Group was engaged to lead the transformation. The approach was rooted in its flexibility, collaboration and deep expertise in both Atlassian products and enterprise service management.

The engagement began with an end-to-end baseline assessment which provided recommendations on all objects that were not in use and could be cleaned up. This included old projects, workflows, custom fields, screens etc. Following the comprehensive kick-off was a series of design workshops, aimed at understanding Enervia’s existing operating model and the intricacies of each team’s processes. Rather than imposing a one-size-fits-all solution, Elegance Group collaborated closely with a core intermediary team at Enervia. This team acted as a bridge to the wider business, ensuring that proposed changes reflected real-world needs and could be adopted smoothly.

Initial solutions were piloted with selected teams and value streams. Feedback was actively sought and incorporated, allowing for rapid iteration and refinement. Once the approach was validated, the project moved into a structured rollout, engaging each value stream in a carefully managed migration process. Teams were aligned to the new ways of working before being migrated into the standardised environment where freedom in the framework allows them to make the best decisions for the organisation.

User onboarding and offboarding were streamlined using Okta, with role-based permissions ensuring that users could only access and execute what was appropriate for their role. Unused add-ons were removed and license management was optimised, reducing complexity and administrative overhead. Comprehensive training programs, including workshops and documentation, enabled Enervia’s internal tech support team to handle the majority of support requests independently.

Throughout the project, continuous engagement was maintained through weekly check-ins and a regular cadence of meetings, keeping the project on track and allowing for ongoing feedback and adjustment. Elegance Group worked closely with Enervia’s change management team to ensure smooth transitions and minimise disruption.

The Impact

The transformation delivered tangible improvements across the organisation, fundamentally changing how Enervia manages and delivers work.

Real-time project dashboards now provide clear visibility into status, milestones and critical tasks, enabling more informed decision-making. With best practice structures in place, data can be surfaced and analysed across teams, supporting strategic planning and resource allocation at every level. This consistent approach has made it much easier for leadership to track progress and identify areas needing attention.

Staff moving between teams now encounter familiar processes and terminology, which has made collaboration easier and significantly reduced onboarding time for new team members or those transitioning between roles. The introduction of automated workflows and integrated toolsets has increased productivity and reduced manual effort, allowing teams to focus on higher-value work instead of administrative tasks.

A significant plus point for Enervia has been the empowerment of its internal teams. There is now a strong focus on enablement, with the internal tech support team able to manage most support needs independently. Only advanced issues now need to be escalated to Elegance Group, making the organisation more self-sufficient. Procurement and technology teams also noted how easy and seamless the procurement process was, further streamlining internal operations.

The project’s adaptability has been a key factor in its success. The team was able to respond to evolving requirements and feedback, ensuring that the solution remained fit for purpose as Enervia’s needs developed. Elegance Group also accommodated Enervia’s security requirements and access restrictions, ensuring progress was maintained even when internal policies presented a few challenges.

With a new environment and strengthened internal capability, Enervia is now well-positioned to expand its use of Atlassian tools and adopt new methodologies as the business evolves. Budget has been allocated for further enhancements, reflecting Enervia’s confidence in the partnership and the value delivered to date.

Through a collaborative, flexible and expert-led approach, Enervia and Elegance Group created a unified, scalable and future-ready Atlassian environment enabling Enervia to continue leading the way in New Zealand’s energy sector.

Key Benefits Gained

• Standardised Workflows: Unified processes across teams, making collaboration easier and reducing onboarding time for staff moving between teams
• Centralised Dashboards: Real-time visibility into project status, milestones and critical tasks, supporting better decision-making and strategic planning
• Automation and Integration: Automated repetitive tasks and integrated Jira with Confluence, streamlining operations and freeing teams to focus on higher-value work
• Improved Reporting: Consistent data structures enable organisation-wide insights and more effective resource allocation
• Empowered Internal Teams: Internal tech support can now resolve most support needs independently, with only advanced issues escalated externally

*Please note Enervia is an alias used to protect the identity of our client.