A high level view of the user’s path to their goal helps keep the design focused. A more visual version of scenarios, flows incorporate alternate paths and some measure of burden that the user will take on. That is, these diagrams show the number of pages/states the user will see on the way to accomplishing their tasks.
While flow diagrams can help the early conversations, it is important to recognize that they are still diagrams and diagrams tend to only be deciphered by their maker. Stakeholders who do not understand them tend to “agree” rather than admit that they don’t understand.
For this reason, I tend to limit the use flow diagrams, or any type of diagram for that matter, outside of the design team. The sooner I can start to talking in a visual language that the stakeholders understand, such as clickable screens, the better.
PersonasFlows allow for the high level visualization personas interaction with the system and with each other.
PathsDefine primary, secondary and tertiary paths through that the design will be focusing on.
InteractionsIt’s not just the pages and the personas that matter, the type of interactions can also be communicated here. Particularly to show excise in a heuristic analysis.
