This issues-only approach, or what I call just task-tracking, is my favorite small-team development process. By small, I mean 2 to 8 people or so.
I resonate with this blog entry because I agree that the visualizations that more sophisticated tools provide are low-value distractions that ultimately cause more problems than they solve. The most important thing for collaborative development, in my opinion, is a clear, accurate, singular definition of work to be done. From there, you can prioritize and adapt as needed, but spending inordinate amounts of time with visualizations (often to satisfy some non-technical stakeholders) is wasteful allocation of resource time.
For example, a golden rule of mine is that you should only have one authoritative system used for task-tracking. Any additional system or tool will inevitably lead to confusion about priorities and lost efficiency, despite the appearances to the contrary that lead you to add a tool in the first place.
I resonate with this blog entry because I agree that the visualizations that more sophisticated tools provide are low-value distractions that ultimately cause more problems than they solve. The most important thing for collaborative development, in my opinion, is a clear, accurate, singular definition of work to be done. From there, you can prioritize and adapt as needed, but spending inordinate amounts of time with visualizations (often to satisfy some non-technical stakeholders) is wasteful allocation of resource time.
My own thinking on task trackers: https://tiamat.tsotech.com/task-tracking
For example, a golden rule of mine is that you should only have one authoritative system used for task-tracking. Any additional system or tool will inevitably lead to confusion about priorities and lost efficiency, despite the appearances to the contrary that lead you to add a tool in the first place.