Book Review: Mike Cohn’s “User Stories Applied: For Agile Software Development”
This post originally appeared on Strategic Product Manager on November 2, 2009
As a <type of user> I want <some goal> so that <some reason>.
Whether you are new to story-driven software development or have been managing products or development with user stories for a decade, “User Stories Applied: For Agile Software Development” (Mike Cohn) is a great read.
I’m personally new to writing user stories, so I dove into Cohn’s book from a relatively fresh perspective, and found the entire book highly digestible. Mr. Cohn makes no assumptions about the readers level of expertise or familiarity with Agile methods. At the same time, he writes in a way that gives the reader credit for being intelligent and purposeful.
The book is broken into 3 parts:
Quick Thoughts on Business Cases
Earlier today, Stewart Rogers asked on Twitter, “Why do a business case?”
My immediate answer was that a business case helps to answer the question, “why are we doing this?” and to define value.
But maybe “define” isn’t the right word. Read more
Thoughts On ProductCamp Atlanta
I’d definitely call ProductCamp Atlanta a success. Colleagues, friends and sponsors have been asking for a post-mortem or a wrap-up post, and now that I’ve had about a week to let it all gel, here it is. I’ve also got some survey results that I’ll post in a few more days. (If you registered for ProductCamp, and haven’t taken the survey yet, please do so, even if you didn’t attend!) Read more
The 5 Most Important Product Management Personalities on Twitter (Plus One)
I’ve seen a few great lists of product managers on Twitter. I think Cindy Alvarez “started it” with this post on her website. It’s certainly the first comprehensive list of “products” people I came across, and it introduced me to a larger world of active professional product management thinkers. Thanks Cindy.
There are a few great lists at WeFollow.com, and other places around the web. The other day Thomas Fuchs-Martin posted his list of 50 Product Managers worth following. It’s a great list too, narrowing down the hundreds into a few dozen key personalities.
But I got to wondering: “Who do products people themselves find most valuable on twitter? Who should I be giving more attention to?” So, like any good, thinking product manager, I asked. I made the question specific, and I made it hard. Read more