Rethinking How We Deliver Progress - From Tasks to Stories

For the past year, we’ve been reporting our progress to stakeholders through JIRA tickets. The idea was to be granular, to show the specific activities we’re working on. But here’s the thing: are we really providing value this way?

Sure, for bug fixes, ticket-level reporting makes sense. But for new features? Are we missing the forest for the trees?

The Problem with Ticket-Level Reporting

1. It’s abstract. What the hell is JIRA-123?
2. It lacks context. How does this fit into the bigger picture?
3. It’s developer-speak. Stakeholders don’t think in tickets.

The Power of Story-Level Reporting

Stories provide clarity. They give insights into what we’ve actually accomplished. They make it easy to understand if we’re solving the right problems. Most importantly, they speak a language everyone can understand.

Think about it. Which of these would you rather share with your boss when they ask “What’s new?”:

1. “We completed JIRA-123: Add profile picture”
2. “We made it so users can see their profile picture, helping them quickly identify themselves”

The second one, right? It’s clear, it’s relatable, and it actually means something to someone who isn’t neck-deep in our codebase.

Time for a Change

I am rethinking to stop wasting time and energy on reports that don’t matter. Let’s start sharing stories that actually show the value we’re creating.

It’s time to change how we communicate our progress. No more task-level updates. From now on, let’s focus on stories. Let’s talk about what we’re building, why we’re building it, and how it makes things better for our users.

That’s how we’ll really show the value we’re delivering. That’s how we’ll get everyone excited about what we’re doing. And that’s how we’ll make sure we’re always working on the stuff that matters most.