4.7: User Story Mapping - Video Tutorials & Practice Problems

<v ->An important backlog refinement technique is</v> called User Story Mapping. The correct technique is the story mapping not exactly user story mapping because we can map epics or higher than epics, the whole features. It is a valuable tool for software development. The concept of story mapping was introduced by Jeff Patton. In this process the team explores the user stories lifecycle. Starting with opportunities and moving deeper into discovery. And then they sequence these user stories into MVP and subsequent releases. In a nutshell, a user story map tells a story about the type of person doing something to reach a goal. A story map represents features that comprise the major product features. And then later they're organized into a subsequent product release. Look at this example. User story map becomes a prerequisite to have a general understanding of the big picture in order to create an informed story map. The story mapping session usually starts with reviewing OKRs for the product or objectives and key results, then major functionality reviewing the persona types and their needs. And then moving top to bottom from requirement collaboration from themes to product features, and sometimes even to user story level. This is not required there, you can stop higher than the user story level. The idea is that the finished product can be used as a skeleton for creating a product backlog. As this slide shows the user story map starts with the personas. It defines epics, or sometimes collection of epics, and then it composes those into features and user stories. Mainly story maps represent the product at an epic level. So the term story map is used versus the user story map. The benefits of story mapping includes first, establishing team collaboration. Second, ability to define the minimum viable product. Third one, exposing any dependencies internal or external. Fourth, is developing a better and more user-centric product. Fifth, is focusing product development teams on features. Features have to provide customer value and improvement. Next one is enabling prioritization process. Top to bottom in the backlog. Enabling the delivery of incremental releases, as we said early and often. And finally setting realistic expectations with customers and stakeholders. So based on alignment and prioritization that is achieved with story mapping, the structure of the product backlog is shared between all the stakeholders. So I hope that you will use this highly effective technique in defining and designing your product backlogs.