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How to Track Request Types in Jira Service Management (JSM)

If you’ve spent any time in Jira Service Management (JSM), you know that managing incoming requests can feel like herding cats. From incidents to service requests to change approvals, it’s easy to lose sight of requests types that are flooding your queues.

But what if there was a simple, label-based system to track request types and generate visual, dashboard-ready insights—without needing a degree in JQL?

Say hello to Advanced Label Manager for Jira. In this article, we’ll show you how to:

  1. Use labels to categorize different request types in JSM using Automation

  2. Use Advanced Label Manager’s built-in dashboard gadgets to gain visibility

  3. Make data-driven decisions (without spreadsheets)

🏷️ Why Use Labels for Tracking Request Types?

You might be wondering—“JSM already has request types, so why use labels too?”

Here’s why:

Request Type (JSM)

Labels (with Advanced Label Manager)

System field (limited reporting)

Fully customizable

Hard to filter across projects

Easy to search, filter, and visualize

Not visible in standard issue search

Labels work everywhere (even in Jira dashboards)

Cannot have multiple types per request

Labels = multi-tagging flexibility

By tagging requests with labels like incident, access-request, or hardware-issue, you can slice and dice your data across projects, teams, and workflows.

🔄 Step 1: Automate Labels with Automation Rules

To avoid manual mistakes or missing labels, use Jira automation to apply labels based on the request type.

Here’s a simple automation rule:

  • Trigger: Work item (issue) created

  • Condition: Request type = “New Employee Onboarding”

  • Action: Add label hr-onboarding

automation-rule.png

Automate labels with Jira Automation rules

📊 Step 2: Use Advanced Label Manager’s Reporting Features

Now here’s where it gets fun. You can visualize the labels setup in the step above.

Advanced Label Manager for Jira offers a clean, powerful interface to:

  1. 🔍 Search and manage labels across all projects

  2. 📈 Generate label usage reports to see how often each label is used and compare

In above example, you can select labels used for request types and generate report like below:

request-types-report.png

Compare requests count by request types in JSM

📌 Summary

Tracking request types in JSM doesn’t need to be complex. With a simple label strategy and the reporting power available in Advanced Label Manager, you can:

  • Improve visibility into what’s coming into your service desk

  • Understand trends and bottlenecks and make data driven decisions

Haven't you used Advanced Label Manager for Jira yet? Then start a 30-day free trial now!

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