Manage stories

Details

To view or edit the story details, click its name in the grid. The following fields are available:

  • State indicates where in the development process the story is. When a story is in the Pending Approval or Ready to Start state and one of its child tasks’ state changes to In Progress or Done, the story’s state is also changed to In Progress.
    If the Map Process Steps to States option on a process flow is enabled, then when you set a state and save the story, the process step will be changed based on its association with the story’s state. If you select the state with no process step mapped, the process step will be changed to the last process step of the previous state (for all states except for the first one in the list) or the first process step of the second state (for the first state in the list).
    Stories must be assigned a sprint to be declared Done. If a story is not assigned a sprint when it is marked Done, a sprint will automatically be assigned based on the story's PI, team, and the date it was accepted.
    Note: If you’re using the Jira connector, the state assignment is locked in Jira Align after it's been set to Done for an item and synced to Jira. To change the state assignment in Jira Align after the story has been synced to Jira, you'll need to change the status assignment on the corresponding Jira issue.
  • Process Step is a part of a developmental process flow and is used to provide a continuous flow of value through the agile process. It depends on the program you select. If the Map Process Steps to States option on the process flow is enabled, then when you set a process step and save the story, the state will be changed based on its association with the process step.
    Note: If you’re using the Jira connector, the process step assignment is locked in Jira Align after it's been set to Done for an item and synced to Jira. To change the process step assignment in Jira Align after the story has been synced to Jira, you'll need to change the status assignment on the corresponding Jira issue.
  • Type indicates the type of the story such as automation, database, defect, design spike, enablement (stories used to support upcoming business requirements), supporting (stories for teams who aren’t development or QA-focused), template, or user. This serves as a way for specialized resources to easily see items they should be focusing on. Most stories should be user type stories.
  • MMF shows whether the story is a part of the minimum marketable feature. 
  • Automation identifies the level of automation related to the story.
  • Contained In shows the parent feature of the story. Clicking the feature opens its slide-out details panel.
  • Program assigns a story to a primary program.
    Note: If you’re using the Jira or Azure DevOps connector, the primary program assignment is locked in Jira Align after it's been set for an item and synced. To change the program assignment in Jira Align after the story has been synced, you'll need to change the project assignment on the corresponding Jira issue or the area path assignment on the Azure DevOps item.
  • Assigned is usually the person who created the story but not always this is the case. The owner manages the story and can provide additional details about it.
  • Find Feature box helps to find a feature you want to make a parent of this story.
  • Feature is the parent feature of this story. If a story belongs to a completed sprint, only a Super Admin can change its parent feature.
  • Program Increment assigns a story to the PI that it is intended for development in. Eligible PIs appear for selection after you select the program.
  • Release Vehicle is a deliverable that's developed during a PI and released on demand. Release vehicles typically relate to service packs or release packages. You can assign a story to any active release vehicles even if they are associated with a different PI than a story. Only the release vehicles with the Planning and In Progress statuses appear here. 
  • Team is the team that will be working to complete this story.
  • Sprint indicates a sprint when this story will be worked on. If you haven’t decided on a sprint yet, you can select Unassigned Backlog.
  • Points are value and effort points defined for a story. LOV (value points) represent an increment of value for the company, such as revenue expectations, improved quality, or speed to market. LOE (effort points) represent the person-days required to do something—such as deliver a story to the Accepted state.
  • Tags make stories much easier to find within a system.

Click Full Details to see the following fields.

  • Design/Assumptions/Notes include any additional notes or design assumptions needed to complete a story.
  • Persona, which are fictional characters that represent users within a targeted demographic, attitude, or behavior, help to better understand and track users in the system.
  • Planning Notes include any additional notes or design assumptions needed to complete a story.

When a story is included into an active sprint, the following fields are locked, which means that to make any changes, the story has to be dropped from the sprint:

  • Program
  • Program Increment
  • Release Vehicle
  • Team
  • Sprint
  • Value Points
  • Effort Points 

To drop a story, click More Options on the right side, and then Drop Story.

Doughnut chart

Use the doughnut chart on the Details tab to understand the amount of work spent and remaining on the story and how long it will take to complete it. The progress is based on the child count. For stories, it will show the count of tasks for them (6 of 10 items complete).

The progress in the center of the circle is a percentage of tasks in the Done state.

The dials are counted as follows:

  • Done (blue) is a percentage of tasks in the Done state.
  • In Progress (orange) is a percentage of tasks in the In Progress state.
  • Not Started (gray) is a percentage of tasks in the Not Started state.

Links

On the Links tab, you can sequence work items. It is used to create a link from one theme, epic, capability, feature, or story to another one to define that the work item cannot be started before the other one is finished.

Important: To turn on the Links tab, select Yes on the Enable Item Link team platform setting.

Additionally, on the visualization chart, you can see the items related to each other on the timeline with respective dates and milestones. The chart shows the relationships between the items that have the predecessors and successors for the item.

  • Predecessor. A theme, an epic, a capability, a feature, or a story that comes before another work item.
  • Successor. A theme, an epic, a capability, a feature, or a story that comes after another work item.

Note: You can select only the items from the same portfolio.

The following relationships are available:

  • Story > story; story > feature; story > capability; story > epic; story > theme.
  • Feature > theme; feature > epic; feature > feature; feature > capability; feature > story.
  • Capability > theme; capability > epic; capability > capability; capability > feature; capability > story.
  • Epic > theme; epic > epic; epic > capability; epic > feature; epic > story.
  • Theme > story; theme > feature; theme > capability; theme > epic; theme > theme.

You can set up multiple predecessors and successors. Adding an item as a predecessor or successor to another item will automatically manage the links for both of them. This means that when item A is listed as a predecessor for item B, item B will be listed as a successor for item A automatically. Also, when item A is listed as a successor for item B, item B will be listed as a predecessor for item A automatically.

The same item cannot be set as a predecessor and a successor. The parent epic cannot be the predecessor or successor for the child feature or story. The child feature and story cannot be the predecessor or successor for the parent epic.

Important: Unlike dependencies, links do not provide the obligation or require any actions to be taken by anyone. They help to draw a picture of item interdependencies on various levels.

To create links:

  1. Go to the Links tab.
  2. Select the portfolio and program from the corresponding drop-down menus.
  3. Add one or multiple theme, epic, capability, feature, or story predecessors.
  4. Add one or multiple theme, epic, capability, feature, or story successors.
  5. Click Save, and then click the View the Predecessors and Successors button to view the created links on the visualization chart.

Visualization chart

The main item is highlighted in blue. Use the toggles on the right to highlight predecessors or successors. The related stories appear in the sprints they are assigned to. The related themes, epics, capabilities, and features appear in the sprints based on the following rules:

  • For predecessors, if all child stories are assigned to sprints, the theme, epic, capability, or feature appears in the last sprint the stories are assigned to.
  • For successors, if all child stories are assigned to sprints, the theme, epic, capability, or feature appears in the first sprint the stories are assigned to.

Predecessors

Themes, epics, capabilities, features, and stories appear in the At Risk column based on the following rules:

  • A theme, a capability (at least one of its child stories or features), a story, a feature, or an epic (at least one of its child stories, features, or capabilities) is in the unassigned backlog OR
  • A theme, a capability (at least one of its child stories or features), a story, a feature, or an epic (at least one of its child stories, features, or capabilities) is assigned to the same sprint as the main item OR
  • A theme, a capability (at least one of its child stories or features), a story, a feature, or an epic (at least one of its child stories, features, or capabilities) is assigned to the sprint that comes after the sprint of the main item.

Successors

Themes, capabilities, epics, features, and stories appear in the Unassigned column based on the following rule:

  • If a theme, a capability (at least one of its child stories or features), a story, a feature, or an epic (at least one of its child stories or features) is in the unassigned backlog.

 

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