Master project documentation template

In the first two sections of this template, dig into the purpose behind your project. In the Unmet needs section, explain why this project exists in the first place. What do your customers expect to accomplish that they can’t right now and how will this project fix it? In the Objectives section, zero in on what you hope to accomplish. Whether it’s increasing paid signups or improving your user reviews, identify your end game so your team knows what it’s driving toward.

With the “why” out of the way, it’s time to focus on the “who.” In the User personas section of the template, list the customer personas that are the main targets for this change. It’s tough to understand a project as a whole without knowing who it was intended for. So, having this context documented here helps all of your team members better grasp the ins and outs of that project.

Job stories are a helpful way to frame the problems your users are facing and address how you’ll solve them. In the jobs section of the template, follow the prompts to piece together your own job story using this formula:

When I describe the specific context
I want to describe user need
So I can describe the reason for the need

For example, here’s what a finished job story from MURAL looks like:

When I am doing a design workshop in MURAL and we come up with action items
I want to easily send them to the issue tracker my team uses
So I can keep working without changing my workflow

Your project doesn’t exist in isolation, and it’s important to have a record of past considerations and decisions. In the History section of the template, describe other strategies you tried to address the issue and what you learned. The Constraints section gives you space to note whether this issue is affected by or affects another project, as those are important dependencies to keep in mind. Finally, the Explorations and decisions section is the spot to record other approaches that were considered, as well as the benefits and drawbacks of each. You don’t want to lose track of what your team brainstorms (even if you don't take action on it for now) – you might just use those nuggets of inspiration later!

If your project has releases, outline them in the Releases table of the template. The template gives you space to jot down the release name, the value that it adds, and the scope. You can also set a status for each release to track how it’s progressing. 

Feel like your project just leads to, well, more projects? That’s normal, and it’s also why jotting down follow-up action items is so important. Whatever needs to be done next, add it as a checklist item in this Next steps space. You can also set a status for each item to help you make sure those things actually get done and don’t fall off your team’s radar.

As much as we’d love to tell you that every single project will be a raging success, you know that isn’t reality. That’s why it’s important to set a benchmark, so you’ll know if your project accomplished what you were expecting. Jot down your benchmark in the Impact section of the template. Whether you hit that mark or not, you’ll be glad to have that metric documented – for both motivation and historical context.