Glossary

Every term, in one place

The same terms you'll see pop up in-scene via the info bubble, gathered here for reference. No need to memorize any of this before you start.

A

Adoption

The rate at which people start, and keep, using a product.

B

Backlog

A prioritized list of everything a team might build, from small fixes to major features.

C

Compliance

Meeting legal, regulatory, or policy standards required before something can be used or released.

D

Dependency

A piece of work that relies on something else being finished first.

Discovery

Talking to and observing real users to validate a problem before building a solution.

L

Launch Readiness

Whether a product, and the team supporting it, is actually prepared for real users at scale.

M

MVP

Minimum Viable Product: the smallest version of a product that is still valuable and usable enough to release.

P

Pilot

A small, limited release used to test an idea with real users before a full rollout.

Prioritization

Deciding which work matters most right now, and what can wait.

Product Assumptions

The unproven beliefs a team is relying on about users, the market, or the solution.

Product Vision

A clear statement of the future the product is trying to create, and for whom.

R

Requirements

The specific conditions a solution must meet to be considered complete or acceptable.

Retrospective

A recurring meeting where a team reflects on how they worked together and identifies one thing to improve.

Risk

Something that could go wrong and affect the outcome, which a team tries to identify and manage in advance.

Root Cause

The underlying reason a problem is happening, as opposed to its visible symptoms.

S

Sprint

A short, fixed period of time (often one to two weeks) in which a team commits to completing a set amount of work.

Sprint Goal

The single outcome a team is trying to achieve by the end of a Sprint, used to guide day-to-day decisions.

Sprint Planning

The meeting where a team decides what work to pull into the next Sprint.

Stakeholder

Anyone outside the immediate team who has an interest in, or influence over, what gets built.

T

Target User

The specific person or group a product is being built to serve.

Team Capacity

How much work a team can realistically take on in a given period without burning out.

Technical Debt

Shortcuts taken during development that make future work slower or riskier until they're addressed.

U

User Problem

The underlying need or pain point a product is meant to solve, distinct from any specific feature.

User Workflow

The sequence of steps a person actually goes through to get something done.

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