Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described that provide for configuring a user equipment (UE) with a number of uplink transmission configuration states that may be mapped to corresponding uplink transmission parameters. The uplink transmission parameters may be associated with one or more of a directional uplink transmission beam, a set of base stations that are to receive an uplink transmission for joint processing, uplink reference signal transmissions, or combinations thereof. An indication of a first uplink transmission configuration state may be provided to the UE, and the UE may transmit the uplink transmission based at least in part on a first set of uplink transmission parameters that are associated with the first uplink transmission configuration state.