Agile Requirements & Documentation Flashcards

How does the concept of 'progressive elaboration' apply to agile requirements documentation?

Answer: Requirements are described at a high level initially and elaborated in detail closer to implementation

Progressive elaboration means requirements start as coarse-grained items (themes, epics) and are refined with more detail just-in-time as they approach development.

Which of the following scenarios best illustrates a violated 'Independent' criterion in the INVEST model?

Answer: Two user stories that must always be implemented together due to a shared database schema

Stories are not independent when they have tight technical or logical coupling that forces them to be developed together, reducing scheduling flexibility.

A BA is documenting non-functional requirements for an e-commerce platform. Which of the following is an example of a well-formed NFR?

Answer: The checkout page must load within 2 seconds under 1,000 concurrent users

Well-formed NFRs are specific and measurable, including the metric, threshold, and conditions under which it applies.

What is the role of the business analyst in a Three Amigos meeting?

Answer: To represent the business perspective and clarify the intent of the user story alongside a developer and tester

In a Three Amigos session, the BA brings business context, the developer brings implementation perspective, and the tester brings a quality mindset to collaboratively define story scope.

A product backlog item is described as 'Improve system performance.' Why is this problematic as a user story, and how should a BA address it?

Answer: It lacks the user, specific outcome, and measurable acceptance criteria — the BA should rewrite it using proper story format with NFR thresholds

A vague statement like 'improve performance' has no user context, no specific goal, and no measurable definition of done, making it impossible to estimate or test without refinement.

When using impact mapping, what is the sequence of questions that structures the technique?

Answer: Why → Who → How → What

Impact mapping starts with the goal (Why), identifies actors (Who), defines impacts on behavior (How), then specifies deliverables (What) — working from business goal outward.

A BA joins a team mid-project and discovers requirements are scattered across emails, sticky notes, and verbal agreements with no central record. What should they prioritize?

Answer: Conduct stakeholder interviews and consolidate known requirements into a structured product backlog

Consolidating scattered knowledge into a structured backlog is the pragmatic first step, giving the team a shared, prioritizable record of requirements.