Understand Personal Contribution Trends
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This guide walks through how to interpret contribution data using the available visualisations and what patterns to look for when evaluating changes in individual performance..
Step 1: Review the Recent Tab
➡️ Where: Contributor Insights > Recent Tab
This tab provides a snapshot of the contributor’s work over the past month.
➡️Key Views:
- Work Breakdown: Shows proportions of New Work, Refactor, Churn, Help.
- Work Heatmap: Displays daily activity levels.
➡️What to look for:
- Shifts in contribution type (e.g., an increase in Help Others may indicate they’re fixing bugs introduced by teammates).
- Higher Churn might mean they’re struggling with a complex task or refactoring their own bugs.
- Activity clusters or patterns—e.g., more work happening on certain days or a drop in engagement on others.
These insights can help uncover whether someone is overburdened, underused, or taking on a different role within the team.
Step 2: Review the Work-log Tab for Trends
➡️ Where: Contributor Insights > Work-log Tab
This section tracks longer-term contribution patterns month over month.
➡️What to look for:
- Consistent week-over-week cycles that follow the rhythm of ticket assigned → code written → ticket resolved.
- Sudden drops or gaps in activity, especially unexplained multi-day lulls.
- What happens after a gap — are there major PRs or a spike in commits that justify the downtime?
If the follow-up work doesn’t justify the inactivity, dig deeper: were there no tasks assigned? Was the contributor blocked?
Step 3: Identify Context Behind Contribution Changes
Use both tabs together to correlate what kind of work is being done and how consistently.
➡️Look for patterns like:
- A spike in Help paired with no new work — this could indicate they’re cleaning up others' code or in a support-heavy sprint.
- Rising Churn and Refactor — signs that they’re iterating heavily on difficult or unclear work.
- Gaps followed by unfocused commits — possibly a sign of context-switching or blocked time.
Step 4: Use Findings to Support Conversations and Planning
The Contributor Insights page isn’t just for evaluation—it’s also a tool for coaching and career development.
➡️Use it to:
- Understand how someone’s work pattern has changed over time.
- Spot trends that suggest burnout, boredom, or skill misalignment.
- Inform 1:1s, retros, or planning sessions with data-backed observations.
Key Takeaways
- Use the Recent Tab to monitor how a contributor’s work type and activity level shift over a month.
- Use the Work-log Tab to track consistency and effort across weeks and months.
- Look for signs of imbalance: too much churn, too many bug fixes, or unexplained activity gaps.
- These insights help support, not scrutinise; use them for coaching, not control.
Updated 2 days ago