Backlog Strategy (Short Version)

Outcomes

This exercise provides an opportunity to increase your awareness of the challenges and dynamics present in a product or project, and how you can implement a strategy to aid the successful delivery.

Timings

• Allow 30 mins for this exercise.

Equipment

• user story templates
• header templates
• sprint goal templates
• archetypes templates
• strategy canvasses
• scissors
• post-it notes
• sharpies or similar

Tasks Part 1: Setting Up The Story Map

1. As a team choose which scenario you would like to tackle
2. Arrange the user stories, and header templates to form a story map and release plan over several sprints, (check out the diagram of the story map.)

Tasks Part 2: Raising Your Strategic Awareness

1. Work through the Strategy Canvas to identify:
2. Your observations of the story map
3. Where you think the value in the work is?
4. Where are the challenges and risks in the work?
5. Are there any dynamics that you can identify that give rise to the challenges and risks?
6. Which of the archetypes do you think are appropriate for the scenario and the corresponding Backlog?
7. How do you think you might implement those archetypes in the Product Backlog?
8. Adjust your Backlog and release plan to implement your chosen archetypes recomposing the content of the sprints to get the best possible outcome

Tasks Part 3: The Debrief

1. Finally on a sheet of flip chart paper write down what you observed from the exercise as a form of self reflection