Cote’ recently posted a good comparison of the features of Enterprise Software versus Consumer Software. Although we may not agree with all the items in his lists (consumer software can have a login, and very often does have upgrade paths), we do appreciate the general classification. And we really like his insight:
Communication / Consulting
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Top Five Ways To Be A Better Listener
Effective listening skills yield great requirements The better you are at listening, the more people will want to tell you. If you’ve ever watched The Actor’s Studio, you’ve heard over and over that the most important skill in acting is reflective listening. A marriage counselor will tell you that step […]
Requirements / Software requirements specification / Writing
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A requirements documentation mistake
Learn from an early mistake of mine At a previous employer, the first time I played the role of requirements manager (technically, program manager – with responsibility for the functional spec), I made a bunch of mistakes – this post is about one of them. The setup We were engaged […]
Communication / Lists / Presentation
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Top five presentation tips
From Start to End has a great post, Some tips on presentations. Very little we can add here – check it out. Our top five presentation tips (our first four picks are from the list behind the link) Know your audience. A key preparation – you have to have a […]
Communication / Requirements / Requirements management software / Software requirements specification / Writing
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Requirements Document Proliferation
Too many companies don’t document their requirements.
Worse still, too many companies over-document their requirements.
Communication / Consulting / Lists / Presentation / Process Improvement / Requirements / Requirements gathering / Software requirements specification
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Brainstorming – Making Something Out of Everything
Previously, we talked about brainstorming as one of the best elicitation techniques for gathering requirements. Here are some details about how to facilitate a general brainstorming session with a group of people in 5 easy steps (and then another 5 easy steps). Seven to ten people is a good number […]
Communication / Consulting / Requirements / Requirements gathering / Software requirements specification
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How To Interview When Gathering Requirements
We previously stressed the importance of understanding why something is a requirement. Unfortunately, we can’t just ask “why why why?!” until we reach the end of the chain. This won’t be any more effective for us now than it was when we were in kindergarden. Eventually, our listeners will get frustrated, or worse, defensive.
Communication / Consulting / Lists / Requirements / Requirements gathering / Software development / Software requirements specification
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Top Five Requirements Gathering Tips
Interviewing, Brainstorming, Documenting Use Cases, Prototyping, and Analyzing Documents are our top-five tips. Read more for details
Communication / Consulting / Requirements / Software requirements specification / Writing
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Are people reading your requirements? A blogversation.
Tony just put up a post at Seilevel’s blog on making sure your spec is reviewed. Kent Newsome recently posted about starting cross-blog conversations here, possibly inspired by Amy Gahran’s post about it here. Tony’s post is a great topic to cross-blog about. Three easy steps to blogversation Post your […]