The two techniques we've described are ideally carried out in collaboration with a good representation of all stakeholders, including the business or customer and the technology team. The more members of the team and the wider group that we can involve, the better. Those involved in the User Story Map creation will not only contribute valuable ideas, but they will also come away with a shared understanding of what we're about to build.

Sometimes it's not possible to include our entire team in the creation of the User Story Map, just because of sheer numbers. Anything more than a maximum of 15 people in one session can be become difficult to facilitate in a way that isn't time-consuming and may result in people not being heard.

If this is the case, we should include as many representatives of our team as we can. Once the User Story Map has been created, it's crucial that we walk our remaining team through the map so that they have a good understanding of what we're hoping to achieve. This is another benefit of creating a User Story Map in such a visible way; we're also able to walk others through it.

The walkthrough will take time, but it is imperative that we get everyone on board with the approach we're taking. We want to avoid anyone making assumptions and taking a different route from the one we've mapped out.