The history of this question goes back to the classic difficulties of interaction between business and IT — subjective opinions, personal impressions, and emotions often distort requirements and priorities (for example, what is "critical" for one is of little interest to another).
Problem: the influence of subjective factors leads to a loss of objectivity, conflicts, and a lack of transparency, which affects the quality of the system and customer satisfaction. Implicit preferences of an important stakeholder can drag unsubstantiated desires into the requirements.
Solution:
Key features:
Is it enough to hold one general meeting for requirement gathering with business experts to eliminate all subjective aspects?
No. In meetings, some opinions are lost due to the dominance of active participants, and important details often remain unaddressed. Individual or small group interviews are necessary, followed by consolidating the results.
Can the product owner's opinion be considered the only true source for all requirements?
No. The product owner is an important source, but other stakeholders (e.g., support, accounting, security, users) may reveal critical nuances, ignoring which can lead to serious errors.
Should we always trust business prioritization of requirements without additional checking of its validity?
No. Prioritization is often subjective and depends on current business goals. It is necessary to justify priorities using value/risk matrices, ROI, and strategic company goals.
Negative case: An analyst agreed on requirements only with a business representative, completely ignoring users and technical specialists.
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Positive case: The analyst worked on a map of key influencing groups, conducted interviews with everyone, captured discrepancies, and prepared a document with prioritization based on objective criteria.
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