Release Overview dashboard

  • Release version: Yokohama
  • Updated April 25, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Release Overview dashboard

    The Release Overview dashboard in the Digital Product Release Workspace offers a comprehensive view of all information relevant to a release, enabling product teams to assess release readiness effectively. Access requires specific ServiceNow AI Platform roles such as product manager, release admin, release coordinator, or release user.

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    To access the dashboard, navigate to Workspaces > Digital Product Release Workspace, select the releases icon, and choose a release from the list.

    Key Features

    • Release Dates: Displays planned and actual start and end dates of the release.
    • Release Target Date: Shows the readiness target date.
    • Risk Score: Reflects the release’s risk level calculated from overdue tasks and policy failures, helping identify potential issues early.
    • Release Tasks: Number of tasks grouped by their current state.
    • Change Requests: Total change requests categorized by phase and state.
    • Enhancements: Lists product enhancements grouped by state.
    • Work Items and Related Tasks: Displayed by type and state, providing detailed insight into ongoing work.
    • Policies and Approvals: Lists all policies by phase and approvals by status, supporting governance and compliance tracking.

    Risk Score Calculation

    The risk score combines two weighted metrics: overdue task score and policy failure score. These scores reflect the percentage of overdue tasks and failed policies respectively, adjusted by the elapsed time within the release timeline.

    • Overdue Task Score: 0 if under 10% tasks overdue, 1 if 10-40%, and 2 if over 40%.
    • Policy Failure Score: 0 if under 10% policies fail, 1 if 10-40%, and 2 if over 40%.
    • The final risk score is calculated with weights assigned to overdue tasks and policy failures, multiplied by the fraction of elapsed release days.

    Risk levels are categorized as:

    • Low: Score 0 or 1
    • Medium: Score 2
    • High: Score 3
    • Very High: Score 4

    This categorization helps you understand and manage release risks proactively, allowing timely interventions to mitigate potential issues.

    The Release Overview dashboard provides an overview of all the information about a release, which the product team can use to assess its readiness.

    Release Overview dashboard provides high-level information about a release and its progress.

    Required ServiceNow AI Platform roles

    sn_dpr_model.product_manager, sn_dpr_model.release_admin, sn_dpr_model.release_coordinator, or sn_dpr_model.release_user, needed to see the dashboard.

    Access the Release Overview dashboard

    To open the dashboard, navigate to Workspaces > Digital Product Release Workspace. Select the releases icon (Releases icon.) and then select a release from the Releases list.

    Widgets

    Widget Description
    Release start date Start date of the release.

    If the release isn’t started, the planned start date is shown. After the release starts, the actual start date is shown.
    Release end date End date of the release.

    If the release isn’t closed, the planned end date is shown. After the release is closed, the actual end date is shown.
    Release target date Readiness target date of the release.
    Risk score Risk level of a release. This score is calculated based on the overdue tasks and policy failures. For more information, see the calculation of the risk score in the following section.
    Release tasks Number of tasks in the release, grouped by their state.
    Change requests Total number of change requests in different phases of the release, grouped by their state.
    Enhancements Product enhancements in the release, grouped by their state.
    Work items Work items in the release, grouped by their type, and stacked by their state.
    Related tasks Related tasks linked to the release, grouped by their type, and stacked by their state.
    Policies List of all policies, grouped by the phases they’re mapped to.
    Approvals List of all approval tasks, grouped by their approval status.

    Calculation of risk score of a release

    The risk score of a release combines overdue task scores and policy failure scores, weighted by their respective importance. The weight or priority to overdue tasks and policy failure determines their urgency or impact on a release. The overdue task score is categorized based on the percentage of overdue tasks. The policy failure score is determined by the percentage of failed policies.

    Given overdue_weight + policy_failure_weight = 1, the risk score of a release is calculated according to the following formula:

    Risk score = Round((Overdue task score * overdue_weight + Policy failure score * policy_failure_weight) * (Number of days elapsed in release / Total number of days in release))

    Where each metric is calculated as follows:
    Overdue task score:
    • If <10% of tasks are overdue, the overdue task score is 0.
    • If 10-40% of tasks are overdue, the overdue task score is 1.
    • If >40% of tasks are overdue, the overdue task score is 2.

    If a task has no end date, the phase's end date is used as the task's due date.

    Policy failure score:
    • If <10% of policies fail, the policy failure score is 0.
    • If 10-40% of policies fail, the policy failure score is 1.
    • If >40% of policies fail, the policy failure score is 2.
    Based on the calculated risk score, the release is categorized into one of the following risk levels:
    • Low, if the value is 0 or 1
    • Medium, if the value is 2
    • High, if the value is 3
    • Very high, if the value is 4
    This categorization can help you determine the risks involved with the release, thus enabling you to take measures to reduce these risks in a timely manner.