The story map in one screen

A story map lays out a product the way its user goes through it. Read it left to right for the journey and top to bottom for what ships first. The method is user story mapping by Jeff Patton; you don’t need to know it to use the map.

Chapters   Sign up                       Book
Steps      1.1 Create     1.2 Confirm    2.1 Pick a     2.2 Pay
               account        email          time slot
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Release 1  SM-1 Email     SM-4 Email     SM-7 Day       SM-9 Card
             sign-up        link           view
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Release 2  SM-2 Google    SM-5 Resend    SM-8 Week      SM-10 Refund
             sign-up        link           view
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Backlog    SM-3 Apple                    SM-11 Join
             sign-up                       waitlist

Each column is a step, each block under the steps is a release, and every story sits where its step and its release cross.

Steps

A step is a moment in the user’s journey where they do something: create an account, pick a time slot, pay. Steps run across the top of the map from left to right in the order the user meets them, and together they form its backbone. Each step is numbered by its place in the journey. In your agent’s tools a step is called an epic.

Chapters

A chapter groups the steps under one name shown above them, like “Sign up” or “Book”. The name is up to you: a stage of the journey or a part of the product. Steps of a chapter stand side by side and are numbered chapter by step: 1.1, 1.2. Steps without a chapter go last. You can collapse a chapter to fold its steps and stories into one narrow column. Chapters are optional, and a map without them works the same.

Stories

A story sits under a step and says what the user gets there. It has a title, a description, a release, a stage and a priority, and can name a persona and an assignee. Every story has a number like SM-142: the project’s key and a counter. Use the number in chats and with your agent: the map’s search and the agent both find a story by it.

• The key is 2 to 6 Latin letters and digits, starting with a letter. You set it when you create the project and can change it later when you edit the project. The numbers stay the same, and the old key still finds them.
• The counter belongs to the project, so stories on all its maps share one sequence. A number is never given to another story, even after the story is deleted.

Acceptance criteria

Criteria are a checklist inside a story: what has to work for the story to count as done. They are not cards on the board. Your agent checks them off one by one as it verifies them. See Write acceptance criteria your agent can check.

Releases

A release is a row across the map: the stories you plan to ship together. Rows go from top to bottom in the order you plan to ship. One release of the map is active at a time, and your agent takes its next story from it. A release can have dates and a goal. Why the first release should be thin is on The slice; how to plan one is on Plan a release.

The backlog

Stories without a release sit in the backlog, the last row when rows are by release. It is a place, not a stage: moving a story there doesn’t change its stage.

Personas

A persona is someone the product is for, with a role, goals and pain points. Personas belong to the project. A story can name the persona it serves; every view can filter by persona, and the Table and the boards can group by it.

Stages

A stage says where a story is in your process, from Idea to Production. Stages belong to the project and are the columns of the Kanban view. See Set up stages.

Where the map lives

A workspace holds projects. A project has its stages, personas and story key, and one or more maps. A map holds the steps, chapters, stories and releases. To look at the same map in other ways, see Use views.