Atlassian DC has reached end-of-life, is it time to get off Jira?

In a previous post, I outlined 3 options for companies considering how to move on from Atlassian DC – migrate to Atlassian Cloud, move to a competitor product or build your own.  

Whichever path you choose, the change represents an inflexion point – an opportunity to re-evaluate whether your tools still fit the business you've become, and whether they might now be holding you back.  

While a direct migration to Atlassian Cloud will be the most natural choice for many, the smart decision will depend on where you are on the proverbial business maturity arc - from a start-up, “making do” with its tools, to a mature organisation, with a deep understanding of its processes and customers' needs.

Stage 1: Making do

Every business has to start somewhere. In the early days, your focus is on getting the flywheel moving. You're less worried about the intricacies of your tooling and more focused on winning customers, building momentum and delivering value. 

At this stage, you’re still figuring things out and will happily trade perfection for good-enough solutions that help you get things done. Tools like Jira provide that power and flexibility straight out of the box. It might be a generalist tool, but you can adapt its workflows to suit your processes and move quickly with little investment. 

And that’s exactly what you should do, at least at first. When companies are small and still forming, very few know what “great” looks like, particularly in a world of constant and accelerating change. Buying a robust, well-supported product is absolutely the right move. 

Stage 2: Growth and frustration

Then comes the growth - your team expands; you enter new markets; your customers expect more. The processes that worked with a small team begin to strain under the weight of scale. Suddenly, your “make-do” solution starts to creak. 

So, you add custom plugins to, well, plug holes, and custom scripts to automate routine work. You introduce workarounds for edge cases that Jira never anticipated. Things somehow hold together, but only just. 

But over time, those quick fixes lead to costly, long-term technical debt:  

• Your system becomes increasingly fragile as plugins, integrations and security patches break. 

• Workflow complexity grows, drifting further away from your real operational needs. 

• Users spend more time bending Jira to fit their processes instead of the other way around. 

Stage 3: Maturity 

Eventually, you reach a stage where you fully understand your business, including what sets you apart from competitors and what it takes to deliver meaningful value to your customers. 

But your solution is lagging – you’re constantly fighting the limits of your platform, and your customers are underserved. You can see several paths forward, but most involve some level of compromise. 

At this point, you need to ask - are our tools serving us, or are we serving them? 

When the technology that once enabled your business now constrains your ability to innovate or compete, it’s time to explore alternatives. This is where the business case for building your own becomes real. 

The case for building your own 

Building a bespoke replacement for Jira is no small undertaking. It requires strong product discipline, organisational commitment and a clear understanding of what you’re trying to achieve.

It should only be considered when you’ve hit the sweet spot of maturity and scale – when the return on investment will warrant the outlay and you’re ready for the next stage of growth. Without both, save your coin for another day. 

But done right, it can be transformative by enabling your organisation to better deliver upon its goals through: 

• Faster iteration on the features that matter most to your customers. 

• Competitive edge built on more precise, differentiated processes. 

• Tighter control on costs, integrations, data, user experience, etc.

• Freedom from vendor priorities and licensing.

When your competitive edge depends on workflows unique to you, it’s probably time to own the system that runs them. 

Final thoughts 

The Atlassian ecosystem has served countless organisations extremely well and will continue to do so for years to come. But for businesses that have evolved beyond the generalist capabilities of off-the-shelf products, it’s no longer a question of if you should move, but when - and how. 

If your current tools are failing to reflect actual business needs, if your competitors are nipping at your heels, and if your customers deserve better, then it’s probably time to build your own. 

And if you do, treat it as a unique opportunity to not only redefine how you deliver value to your customers, but as an opportunity to drive your business to the next level.