Connecting EAP with Collaborative Work Management
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Summary of Connecting EAP with Collaborative Work Management
The integration between Enterprise Agile Planning (EAP) and Collaborative Work Management (CWM) enhances visibility and streamlines agile planning and execution for teams. It connects strategic program planning with team-level work in a unified system, removing silos and improving delivery predictability. Program managers use EAP to define Program Increment (PI) objectives, align work items like Epics, Features, and Stories, create sprints, and manage dependencies across teams. Product owners and team members use CWM to plan and execute sprints, manage agile stories alongside operational tasks, and track progress within a single workspace.
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This connection reduces context switching and ensures alignment between planned strategic goals and day-to-day team activities, providing leadership with end-to-end transparency of progress against PI goals while maintaining team agility.
Workflow and Integration Details
- An EAP administrator connects an EAP team to CWM, which creates a new Space and Board in CWM for that team.
- Existing work items assigned to the team are synchronized to the CWM Board using Connected Work filters.
- The Sprint Planning view is enabled in CWM, automatically displaying existing work items and sprints.
- Teams manage and update their work directly in CWM; progress and status updates reflect back in the EAP Team dashboard.
- Team members require CWM user access ([sncwm.cwmuser]) to interact with CWM boards.
Sprint Management
- Sprints and assigned work created in EAP automatically sync to CWM and appear in the Sprint Planning view.
- Teams update work status and complete sprints from the CWM Board; incomplete work can be moved to the backlog or next sprint.
- New sprints must be created in EAP (not directly in CWM). Sprints are generated automatically when a Planning Interval (PI) is defined for the Agile Release Train (ART) and then synced to CWM.
- In EAP, Backlog and Hierarchy tabs remain accessible for connected teams, but sprint start and completion controls are disabled because these actions occur in CWM.
Benefits for ServiceNow Customers
- Unified strategic and team-level agile planning and execution within ServiceNow, improving cross-team coordination.
- Reduced context switching by consolidating agile work and operational tasks in one workspace.
- Real-time visibility into sprint progress and PI goal achievement for leadership and teams.
- Improved traceability of work from enterprise priorities down to team execution.
- Streamlined sprint management enabling teams to focus on delivery rather than administrative tasks.
Enhance visibility and streamline planning for your Agile teams by connecting Enterprise Agile Planning (EAP) with Collaborative Work Management (CWM).
Overview of EAP-CWM connection
The EAP-CWM integration enables organizations to connect strategic program planning with team-level execution in a single system, eliminating silos and improving delivery predictability.
Using EAP, program managers and release train engineers can define Program Increment (PI) objectives, align Epics, Features, and Stories, create sprints for teams, and manage cross-team dependencies. After completing a PI, they can conduct PI retrospectives and update roadmaps for the next cycle. These capabilities ensure that enterprise priorities are clearly structured and traceable across all levels.
By linking EAP to CWM. Product owners and team members can plan and execute sprints. They can also manage agile stories alongside operational tasks such as incidents, track progress, and hold team-level retrospectives, all within the same workspace.
This connection between the applications reduces context switching and ensures that both planned and unplanned work is accounted for, without losing alignment to strategic goals. The result is end-to-end transparency where leadership can track progress against PI goals through EAP, while teams maintain flexibility to adapt to changing priorities.
Workflow of EAP-CWM integration
- EAP admin connects an EAP team to CWM. See Connect an EAP team with CWM.
- A new Space and Board are created for this EAP team in the CWM workspace.
- Existing work items assigned to this EAP team are brought over to the newly created CWM Board through Connected Work filters.
- Sprint planning view is enabled for this CWM Board where the existing work items and sprints are automatically shown.
- Check team's access to CWM and provide the CWM user [sn_cwm.cwm_user] to all team members.
- EAP team can start creating more work, manage current work, and update progress directly from the CWM Board. See Sprint planning in CWM.
- The team's progress and work status is reflected back on the Team dashboard in the EAP workspace. See EAP Agile Team dashboard
Creating or managing sprints for EAP teams in CWM
For EAP teams integrated with CWM, existing sprints and their scheduled work automatically sync to CWM. These details are displayed in the Sprint Planning view on the CWM Board.
As the team progresses through assigned work, they can update the work status directly in the Sprints section. The sprint can be marked Complete from this view and any incomplete work items can be moved either to the backlog or the next sprint, if it exists.
New sprints for the team must be created in EAP. After creating new sprints in EAP, they will sync to CWM, allowing the team to schedule work into these sprints from CWM.
Backlog and Hierarchy tabs for connected teams
The Backlog and Hierarchy tabs in EAP remain available for teams connected to CWM, so you can continue to view and manage the team's work items in EAP.
Because sprints are started and completed from the CWM Board, the Start Sprint and Complete Sprint options are hidden in the EAP Backlog for these teams. For more information, see Start or complete iterations in EAP.