Good point. Themes are a good way of categorizing multiple related stories. This can make the backlog much more manageable to present to customers. Themes can also give you more wiggle room. If you commit to high level themes, you can determine how deep to go / what the specific stories will be as you go along. This will allow you to be much more agile than if you committed at the story level.
Now if a customer is interested in a theme, you might go into more detail with them, have them rank the stories within the theme, etc.
One thing to watch out for is that you don't want to prioritize solely at the theme level. Even if it is the most important theme, it is likely that several of the stories in the theme are less important than stories in some of the other themes. You don't want to give them artificially high priority just because they're in the theme. Instead, the priority should be given on their own merits.
Themes
Good point. Themes are a good way of categorizing multiple related stories. This can make the backlog much more manageable to present to customers. Themes can also give you more wiggle room. If you commit to high level themes, you can determine how deep to go / what the specific stories will be as you go along. This will allow you to be much more agile than if you committed at the story level.
Now if a customer is interested in a theme, you might go into more detail with them, have them rank the stories within the theme, etc.
One thing to watch out for is that you don't want to prioritize solely at the theme level. Even if it is the most important theme, it is likely that several of the stories in the theme are less important than stories in some of the other themes. You don't want to give them artificially high priority just because they're in the theme. Instead, the priority should be given on their own merits.