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Agile epic example

Epic is a larger chunk of broken requirements or features that is fed into the Product Backlog Items. How to define an epic? It is not that simple. The epic is an item that is larger than the typical user story. It helps in decoding the final requirements of the customer. The epic in the product backlog must be broken down into smaller user stories so that these can be converted into tasks in the sprint backlog. However, when compared to the huge and vague requirements of the customer the epic is smaller but larger than the user story. What is important is that breaking up the epic into still smaller pieces provides the user stories. Enroll for scrum master certification online at StarAgile and learn the important concepts and principles of scrum and agile in the training.

Agile epics example

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Let us consider 2 examples to see what is an epic? And how the user stories are created from it.

Example 1: - Maximizing the Training Institutes revenue.

The training institute wants to offer training in different fields that are high in quality and comparable in prices with that of other training institutes offering similar courses. It depends on a lot of factors such as price, duration, quality of training, as comparable to other institutes in the same field, mode of training, experience, and knowledge of the trainers, the study materials, placement supports, membership in the industry, etc.

1: As an owner of the training institute, I want to set the optimal rate for the courses in my training institute.

Let us first discuss a particular course such as Scrum Master Certification for the sake of simplicity and understanding the concept, the same principles probably apply to all the other courses.

The general formula for the rate of the CSM training course can be applied and is as follows,

CSM training course = f(a,b,c.....)

The CSM training course is the function of a lot of factors as discussed above such as quality of training, mode of training, duration, experience and knowledge of the trainers, the study materials, placement supports, comparable to another institute in the same field, membership in the industry, etc.

1a: As an owner of the training institute, I want to set an optimal rate for the CSM course fee based on the historical data of 1 year

1b: As an owner of the training institute, I want to set an optimal rate for the CSM course fee comparable to other institutes in the same field.

and so on...

Story 1a: Tell us about the historical 1-year data of the price in the same institute for the same course

Story 1b: Tell us about the comparable other institutes for the same course.

These stories are fairly large on its own; it cannot be implemented in one sprint. Also as implemented the CSM training course fee first would depend on

CSM training course = f(a)

then,

CSM training course = f(a,b)

then,

CSM training course = f(a,b,c) and so on...

So after one sprint, the system has generated a value that cannot be the fee calculation for the candidates because it considered only 1 factor. There may be more factors to be considered built up incrementally before we arrive at the final fee calculation.

The story 1b: above is too big and here's how it can be split,

1b1: As a training institute owner I want to set a comparable set of training institutes.

1b2: As a training institute owner I want to add the training institutes to the comparable set of training institutes.

1b3: As a training institute owner I want to remove a training institute from the comparable set.

1b4: As a training institute owner I want to delete a comparable set that I no longer require.

1b5: As a training institute owner I want to set a comparable rate as that of my institute.

There are a couple more epics,

1c: As a training institute owner I want to set the fee as per the quality of the training

1d: As a training institute owner I want to set the fee as per the duration of the training

And so on...

Epic example 2: Promotion of E-commerce site.

Before we begin the second example we recommend you to take up certified scrum master online at StarAgile institute and learn the theory of scrum with real-world examples. This second example is a company that sells products through an e-commerce website. The target user is the general manager of marketing who is trying to figure out how to spend the ad budget to promote the e-commerce company. The user's large story that is epic is as follows,

1: As a general manager of marketing, I want to review the historical promotions of the e-commerce site and then build my case so that I can identify and repeat the most profitable campaigns.

The team working on this said this is an epic so they wanted it split further.

1a: As a general manager of the company, I want to select the timeframe to use to find out the historical ad campaigns.

1b: As a general manager of the company, I want to select the type of ad campaigns such as from email, TV, Google ads, radio, and other popular websites for posting the ads, etc.

Then I asked the team whether which one would be an epic and which one would be a user story such that epic needs further breaking down. They brainstormed with each other and came up with the answers, the first one would take only a few days, so we left that, the second one would take few weeks so that needs further breaking down,

1b1: As a general manager of the company I want to see information on emails when reviewing the historical campaigns.

1b2: As a general manager of the company I want to see information on the TV ads when reviewing the historical campaigns.

1c3: As a general manager of the company I want to see information on Google ads when reviewing the historical campaigns

And so on...for each type of ads campaigns.

Now if you consider each of the stories is relatively small as the estimates would be in days and not in weeks. However, each needed a few more level details for a particular ad campaign also called a story's "conditions of satisfaction", which are nothing but high-level acceptance tests. For an example of the TV ads, the further information that was captured and wanted are

- Number of viewers by age range

- The number of viewers by income levels, etc...

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Find the difference between epic and feature and user story. Read our detailed blog

Conclusion

We have seen 2 examples of epics that are discussed here. Do you want to learn more? We recommend you to take up CSM certification online at StarAgile institute. StarAgile is a training partner of Scrum Alliance Inc to deliver the scrum master certification training online. StarAgile is an industry-recognized training institute that imparts training in a lot of course including the CSM online, what are you waiting for? Register Now!!! And Keep Learning!!!

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