Groundbreaking UX using User flows in Agile, Scrum
When starting to build any product using conventional software development methodology, it’s the architecture that takes most effort and time. And, definitely it is valuable to invest more on building up the strongest foundation. Although, the aim is to baseline and lay down the strong grounds of the application, I doubt that it ever gets accomplished by anyone the first time, no matter how expert they could be.
But, in Agile when we are not bound of thinking all of it in the beginning and can focus on broken down Epics, we can make use of some greatest benefits of Legend “Waterfallish” approach. One of the techniques that I like the most in Architecture designing is User Flows Creation.
So, what are User flows? I bet you can find many definitions out there, but here’s my simple version: “User Flow is the way where you as a User can walk into the application, step by step.”
While you’re putting the flows together of different users of your application you can get an idea of complexity within it. So, breaking down the complexity that comes across would lead into simplifying the User Experience of your entire system. When it’s time to set up customer’s user experience, I understand, it is not that simple as said. And while doing product management I’ve experienced it is the hardest part for someone who is new to UX but even for the high-tech engineers and designers, since they are not groomed in that direction usually.
The solution is simple where anyone will have to wear the hat of an Architect and think from the users’ perspective. And, I will guide you how:
Let’s dive in with basic steps that would lead you to create your basic User flow:
Starting with some Prerequisites:
1. You have to have your application’s User Persona defined
2. You have identified Epics in your application
3. You’ve extracted User Stories against the epics
If not, please visit and see my another writeup “Setting up a Solid UI/UX Foundation for Startups”
Once ready with the prerequisites? You are head-set to pick up a pencil and paper and draw the first user flow of a very common epic of users logging in the application by looking onto following example:
First, we have picked two User Persona in our example logistics mobile app:
1. Cargo Owner 2. Admin
Second, let’s take an epic named: “Users Login” and give it an ID = 2
Third, below are the extracted User-stories in this epic:
2.1. As a Cargo Owner I want to login using the mobile number and password so that I can start using the application.
2.3. As a Cargo Owner, I want to have my credentials saved on my phone so that I do not need to login again and again
2.4. As a Cargo Owner, I want to Recover my password so that I can use this option in case I forgot my password.
2.5. As a Cargo Owner I want to see relevant screens after login so that I can enter into the app features to use
2.6. As an Administrator I want to Login to the Admin Dashboard so that I can view available functions.
So, with all the above information in hand here’s your basic User Flow:
Similarly, once you’ve defined different user flows against all of your product’s epics and user stories, a clear picture will be available to you in terms of the project scope and which components are associated with which users. So, this leads you in the direction of Wireframes creation and adding valuable key learnings from above, to have a remarkable user experience of your product.
