The best way to avoid losing the benefit is to write benefit-driven stories.
- For this benefit, as a user role, this capability I need.
The key is to lead with the benefit — since folks won’t forget to include the capability.
Of course, Yoda phrasing gets pretty annoying pretty quick. Here’s an actual user story of mine from an internal RFC:
- To make the product easier to use, as a subscriber, you want to activate only the features that you are using, and hide unused features.
Very easy to read, and it keeps the important bit front-and-center: ease of use.
Some folks refer to this sort of thing as “Feature Injection”.
For more, see
- Feature Injection User Stories on a Business Value Theme
- Getting to Why (ButtonClick Admin podcast) – Starts at 4:00
Do you work from user stories? Do you sometimes find yourself scratching your head, and wondering why? Do you think benefit-first user stories would help you design better software?
Ted Husted is a Kaizen Squad developer on the Nimble AMS product crew. “We make the good changes that create a great product.”
