Purpose

Integrate sustainability thinking into backlog refinement and sprint planning without introducing additional meetings or heavy process updates.

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Use this tool:

• During backlog refinement or sprint planning.
• Early in the scoping process for a feature or product.
• When prioritising work for a sprint.

You'll get:

• A short list of sustainability and impact questions to ask alongside usual planning discussions.
• A quick way to identify high‑impact decisions before they are locked in.
• A record of stories or features that may need further review. </aside>

Getting started

1. Choose 3–5 prompts from the list below that are most relevant to the work you are planning.
2. Add them to your backlog refinement or sprint planning session.
3. Capture any actions, tags, or story changes that result.
4. Feed those into your backlog or link them to [Impact Tags] for follow‑up.

Prompt list

Ask these questions about each story, epic, or feature:

• Could this feature make it easier for users to choose a lower‑impact option in the real world (e.g. shared transport, local pickup, reduced travel)?
• Does this feature work equally well for users with different abilities, devices, or connection speeds?
• Could we meet this need by re‑using or adapting something we already have?
• Is this solving a clear, current need, or is it adding unused complexity?
• What happens if this becomes the default for many users over time?
• Could we design this to work with less data, less energy, or fewer steps?
• If the environmental impact of this feature were visible to users, would they still want it?