Prioritizing
Many Product Owners see prioritizing as the biggest problem of their work. Betterplan helps in two ways: with a global priority rule that applies to the whole project, and with the Storyboard, which makes the first prioritization easier. The two are not the same thing. This page explains the difference with QuickCart.
The global rule: stop starting, start finishing
A Story's priority rises with its maturity: whatever is furthest along has the highest priority. Finish first, then start something new. Within a stage, the top-to-bottom order in the Backlog decides: what is on top is next.
The stages, from highest to lowest priority:
| State | Note |
|---|---|
| Done (still open) | Highest priority: the work is finished and only waits to be closed |
| Doing | |
| Todo | |
| Ready | |
| Draft | |
| Idea | |
| Closed | Lowest stage: finished Stories, nothing left to do |
The states are explained on the page States. The rule is named after the principle behind it: whoever starts before something is finished spreads attention and lengthens every lead time.
Global priority determines the order of the cards in every column of the Backlog Kanban, the order of swimlanes on the Iteration Board and the sequence in which the Delivery Timeline schedules open Stories. The forecast therefore follows this rule, not the order in the Storyboard.
Buckets as an intermediate level
If there are Buckets, Betterplan sorts within a state first by the order of the Bucket rows and only then by the position in the column. Stories without a Bucket (the Backlog row) come after all Bucket rows. The full order is therefore: state, then Bucket row, then position in the column.
An example from QuickCart
The behavior is not obvious at first sight, so here is an example. In the QuickCart Storyboard, the Epic Offers & Promotions with the Story Apply promo codes sits in the first Initiative, Browse & Shop, so at the far left. The Story Assign driver, on the other hand, is in the Epic Packing & Shipping of the fourth Initiative, Fulfill Orders, far to the right.
Which Story is more important? By position in the Storyboard it would be Apply promo codes. By the global rule it is Assign driver:
| Story | State | Priority |
|---|---|---|
| Assign driver | Doing | highest |
| Payment methods | Todo | below |
| View order history | Ready | below |
| Apply promo codes | Idea | lowest |
Assign driver is already being built, so it should be finished first. Apply promo codes is only an idea. In the Kanban you see this in the columns. The Delivery Timeline schedules the Stories in the same ranking, although the Storyboard tells it differently.
The Idea column also holds Bundle deals and many more Stories. Between them, only the order in the column decides: the card further up comes first.
If you want Apply promo codes to come sooner, you have two options: drag the Story further right in the Kanban, for example to Draft, if you are actually clarifying it. If instead another idea, such as Chat with driver, should come first among the ideas, move it up within its column (Move to Top). Moving it in the Storyboard changes nothing about this.
The Storyboard is for the first prioritization
The Storyboard is the User Story Map of your undertaking. Its value for prioritizing lies at the start: if you have told the story well, the structure inevitably yields a first step that has to happen before the second. That gives you your first order, which you then carry on in the Backlog.
A card's position in the Storyboard (Initiatives and Epics from left to right, Stories in a stack from top to bottom) describes the structure and the narrative. It is an order of its own that Betterplan stores separately from priority. If you drag a Story up in the Storyboard, you move it in the narrative, not in the priority.
The structure carries the first priority
A Storyboard divides your undertaking in four ways. Each answers a different question:
| Axis | Where in the Storyboard | Question |
|---|---|---|
| Theme | Initiatives (columns on top) | What is this about at all? |
| Time | Epics, from left to right | What has to happen before what? |
| Options | Stories in the stack under an Epic | Which variants and stages are there? |
| Impact | Release rows | Which Stories do I need to reach a goal? |
There is always a first step that has to happen before the second. So you don't have to weigh everything against everything, only within an Epic and between the Releases.
Step by step with QuickCart
- Check the order of the steps. Read the Epics from left to right, in the Initiative Browse & Shop that is Product search, Product details, Cart, Offers & Promotions. If the story doesn't add up, drag the Epic to the right place.
- Order the options in the Epic. Below every Epic there are several Stories as alternatives. Drag the most important one to the top. That sets the order of the narrative, your first assumption on whether search should deliver categories or filters first. The binding priority only arises in the Backlog (see above).
- Set the Releases. A Release is a goal. Drag the Stories that reach the goal into the Release's row, and leave everything else in a later row or in Unplanned Stories. In QuickCart, MVP - Customer v1.0 holds what a customer needs for the first order. Discounts and promotions wait in v2.0 - Complete Platform.
- Compare the sums. The Σ on each row adds up the estimates. If a Release is bigger than your team can handle, move Stories to the next one. That's how you cut the Scope before work begins (see Estimation basics). Stories without an estimate of their own already count, see Automatic estimates.
- Check dependencies. Hold D: the cables show which Story has to come before which. If a blocking Story lies in a later Release than the blocked one, the order doesn't fit (see Dependencies and references).
- Focus. Collapse Initiatives with Focus this and Release rows with the arrow until only the question you are clarifying remains. With the filter you show just one Release, for example.
- Carry on in the Backlog. Switch to the Backlog Kanban and bring the Stories into the order in which you really want to tackle them. From here on the global rule applies.
If prioritizing feels hard, the cause is often the structure: Stories that are too big, Epics in the wrong order or a missing Release goal make every decision a chore. Tidy the structure first, and the priority almost follows by itself.
Defend the plan
In daily business stakeholders arrive with urgent requests. Then a plan you can show helps. The Roadmap presents the same Releases as goals with features and metrics, Orbit tells the structure as a picture, and the Delivery Timeline shows what the global priority means in dates. With them you explain not only what comes next but also why, and you see immediately what a new request would push out.
Background
- Getting started with Betterplan describes the principle.
- Priorisierung ist das größte Problem von Product Ownern shows how a story map helps (German only).