How to Map BPMN with User Stories?

Creating a user stories layer

Instead of writing user stories directly on a BPD, we will write them to a separate diagram layer. This step is not a must, but when you put the user stories in a layer, you can control their visibility easily by hiding and showing the layer. This can be important because you may not want to stories to appear all the time. When you are discussing the business process, you may want to focus on the business workflow instead of being distracted by other shapes.

1. Download Inventory-Management-System.vpp.
2. Open Inventory-Management-System.vpp by selecting Project > Open from the application toolbar and selecting Inventory-Management-System.vpp you just downloaded.
3. Open the business process diagram Track Item.
   
4. Select View > Layers from the application toolbar.
5. In the Diagram Layers window, click on Create new layer and then enter User Stories as the name of layer.
   
6. Click Close to return to the diagram. From now on, the shapes you draw in the diagram will be in the User Stories layer.

Drawing user stories in BPD

Assuming that you are studying the process (diagram) with stakeholder and coming across the Find Item in Inventory task. After a discussing with the stakeholder, several user stories are found:

• User can search item with serial number
• User can search on iPad
• User can search on Android
• User can see the result on a virtual 3D map

In this section you are going to draw these stories on the BPD.

1. Select User Story from the diagram toolbar. You may need to scroll down a little bit in order to find it.
   
2. Click on the diagram to create a story card and then enter User can search item with serial number as name.
   
3. The story card seems to be a bit big. Let's resize it to make it smaller.
   
4. Instead of putting the story card loosely on the diagram, let's connect it with the task to form a 'mapping'. Press on the Generic Connector resource at the top left of the user story and then drag to the task Find Item in Inventory.
   
5. Release the mouse button to create the connector. Drag on the connector to adjust its turning points.
   
6. To prevent readers from mixing up the generic connector with BPMN sequence flow, let's give the connector a different look. Move your mouse pointer over the generic connector and click on Format Line.
   
7. Select the dotted line style.
   
   Up to now, your BPD should look like this:
   
8. Apply the same techniques to draw the other three user stories.
   
9. Let's say you have just finished studying the process with stakeholder. Two more user stories User can forward the result to teammate(s) and User can save the result are found from the tasks Report Item Not Found and Report Item Found respectively. Let's draw the user stories on the diagram and have them mapped from the corresponding tasks.
   
10. The user story User can save the result also satisfies the task Report Item Not Found. Let's map the user story and task with a generic connector.
    

Hiding the user stories layer

You have done. Let's say you want to discuss the business process with a senior executive who are not interested in those user stories. In this section you will hide the User Stories layer.

1. Select View > Layers from the application toolbar.
2. In the Diagram Layers window, uncheck Visible for the User Stories layer.
   
3. Click Close to return to the diagram. You will see the stories are gone.