8. Common pitfalls
• Lack of context
• Fail to deliver value
• Overly specified
• User/Client doesnt know
what they want.
• No priorization
• Hard to build incrementaly
• Difficult to estimate
• Too long… Didn’t read.
• Too technical… Didn’t read.
• Long time to market cycle
• Not always clear who the
users are and what they
expect from the software.
• Long feedback loops
from users/stakeholders
• Acceptance criteria is:
everything is implemented.
• Hard to maintain
12. How do User Stories
address those problems?
• Provide Context =>
Aligment
• End user/customer
language, makes it easy
to read/understand
bridges the gap between
technical and business
• Focus on Delivering Value
• User/Customer centered
• Small, Cheap
• Easily priorizable and re-
priorizable
• Versatile
• Switch the focus to
communication instead of
a detailed specification.
• Shortens Time to Market.
13. What is a user story?
three critical parts:
– Card
– Conversation
– Confirmation
(“conversation placeholders”)
16. Defining a “good” u.s.
• follows the INVEST acronym
(by Bill Wake)
• Defines conditions FOR
“satisfaction” (in DoD)
• Defines conditions FOR
“readyness” (in DoR)
17. Defining a “good” U.S.
• Uses the customer’s language
• has the Who, the What and Why
• Everyone participates in
defining/refining
24. N for Negotiable
• Avoid implementation details
– It says the What, not the How.
• Its not carved in stone
– Until its part of an iteration it
can still be rewritten
34. What?
• The process context:
– Definition of Done
– Definition of Ready
• Non functional requirements:
– Requirements that extend
through the whole project
35. Use aids to “Power Up”
• Wireframes
• Navigation maps
• Color tags
• Personas
• User Story maps
• Anything else you may find
useful
36. Use aids to “Power Up”
• Wireframes
• Navigation maps
• Color tags
• Personas
• User Story maps
• Anything else you may find useful
37. Revise and Refine and even
Re-do
• User stories are alive, they:
– Are Born
– Grow
– Reproduce
– Die
• Make time to groom your
backlog with the team and client
39. User Story smells…
• Too much detail or too little detail
• No conditions of satisfaction
• A story per page/component or
sliced in ways that don’t deliver value
• Technical tasks masqueraded as user
stories
• Skipping the conversation
41. Where DO I get more info?
• Agile Barcelona community (@agilebcn)
• Books:
– User stories applied: For Agile Software
Development by Mike Cohn
– Lean UX: Applying Lean Principles to Improve
User Experience by Jeff Gothelf & Josh Seiden
• The Mountain Goat Software:
http://www.mountaingoatsoftware.com/
• Google
