Prompt Board

Planning

User story map template

Activities and steps across the top, stories below, and release lines that mark what ships first.

Use this template
Story map: booking a bike repair onlineUser: a cyclist whose bike needs fixing this week. Read left to right in the order they do things; higher cards ship first.ActivitiesStepsFind a repair slotChoose therepairPick a dayBook the repairEnter bikedetailsConfirm thebookingHand over the bikeDrop thebike offAgree thequoteFollow the repairCheckprogressApproveextra workCollect the bikePayPick thebike upRelease 1: walkingskeletonOutcome: acyclist booksand collects arepair withoutphoning the shopPick fromthree fixedservicesSee freedays thisweekType makeandproblemBookingemail sentShowbookingnumber atthe counterQuote sentby emailText whenthe bike isreadyShopphonesabout extraworkPay at thecounterReady textgivesopeninghoursRelease 2Outcome:fewer calls toask where thebike is orwhat it costsAdd aphoto of theproblemPick a timeslotSave bikesto anaccountAdd tocalendarApprovethe quoteonlineStatuspage foreachbookingApproveextra partsonlinePay onlinebeforepickupLaterIdeas withno releaseyetRebook thelast serviceWaiting listfor fulldaysReminderfor the nextservice
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What it is

A user story map lays a product's backlog out as the story of one user. The things they do run left to right in the order they do them, and the stories for each step hang underneath, most important at the top. Lines across the map cut it into releases. Jeff Patton, whose book User Story Mapping describes the method, borrows Alistair Cockburn's name for the thinnest slice that still works end to end: a walking skeleton.

When to use it

  • Before the first release of a new product, to agree what the smallest useful version is
  • When a flat backlog has hundreds of tickets and nobody can say what a release delivers
  • When a feature touches several steps of the user's day and needs to ship in pieces

How to run it

  1. 01

    Name the user and the goal

    Write who the map is about and what they are trying to get done. This board follows a cyclist booking a bike repair.

  2. 02

    Lay out the backbone

    Add the steps the user takes as short verb phrases, left to right, then group them under activities. Tell the story out loud and fix the order wherever it sounds wrong.

  3. 03

    Hang stories under each step

    Add the stories that would support each step. Put the ones the user can't do without near the top and the nice-to-haves further down.

  4. 04

    Draw the release lines

    Move the lines until the top slice lets the user reach the goal from start to finish. Write the outcome each release is meant to bring on the note at its left.

How to create a user story map, with a worked example

Opens a new board from this prompt:

"User story map for a recipe app where home cooks plan a week of meals and build a shopping list, with two releases"

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