User Story Mapping: Discover the Whole Story, Build the Right Product

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"O'Reilly Media, Inc.", Sep 5, 2014 - Business & Economics - 324 pages

User story mapping is a valuable tool for software development, once you understand why and how to use it. This insightful book examines how this often misunderstood technique can help your team stay focused on users and their needs without getting lost in the enthusiasm for individual product features.

Author Jeff Patton shows you how changeable story maps enable your team to hold better conversations about the project throughout the development process. Your team will learn to come away with a shared understanding of what you’re attempting to build and why.

  • Get a high-level view of story mapping, with an exercise to learn key concepts quickly
  • Understand how stories really work, and how they come to life in Agile and Lean projects
  • Dive into a story’s lifecycle, starting with opportunities and moving deeper into discovery
  • Prepare your stories, pay attention while they’re built, and learn from those you convert to working software
 

Contents

Chapter 1 The Big Picture
1
Chapter 2 Plan to Build Less
21
Chapter 3 Plan to Learn Faster
37
Chapter 4 Plan to Finish on Time
51
Chapter 5 You Already Know How
67
Chapter 6 The Real Story About Stories
89
Chapter 7 Telling Better Stories
97
Chapter 8 Its Not All on the Card
109
Chapter 13 Start with Opportunities
167
Chapter 14 Using Discovery to Build Shared Understanding
181
Chapter 15 Using Discovery for Validated Learning
201
Chapter 16 Refine Define and Build
217
Chapter 17 Stories Are Actually Like Asteroids
239
Chapter 18 Learn from Everything You Build
247
The End or Is It?
259
Acknowledgments
261

Chapter 9 The Card Is Just the Beginning
121
Chapter 10 Bake Stories Like Cake
131
Chapter 11 Rock Breaking
137
Chapter 12 Rock Breakers
155
References
265
Index
267
About the Author
277
Copyright

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About the author (2014)

Over his past two decades of experience, Jeff Patton has learned there’s no “one right way” to design and build software, but there’s lots of wrong ways. Jeff makes use of over 15 years experience with a wide variety of products from on-line aircraft parts ordering to electronic medical records to help organizations improve the way they work. Where many development processes focus on delivery speed and efficiency, Jeff balances those concerns with the need for building products that deliver exceptional value and marketplace success. Jeff has focused on Agile approaches since working on an early Extreme Programming team in 2000. In particular he specializes in integrating effective user experience design and product management practice with strong engineering practice.Jeff currently works as an independent consultant, agile process coach, product design process coach, and instructor. Current articles, essays, and presentations on variety of topics in Agile product development can be found at www.AgileProductDesign.com and in Alistair Cockburn’s Crystal Clear. Jeff is founder and list moderator of the agile-usability Yahoo discussion group, a columnist with StickyMinds.com and IEEE Software, a Certified Scrum Trainer, and winner of the Agile Alliance’s 2007 Gordon Pask Award for contributions to Agile Development. Peter Economy is co-author of "At the Helm: Business Lessons for Navigating Rough Waters" & the best-selling book "Managing for Dummies".

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