Hi,
Although I have a very good grasp of partnering with both the business and technology groups to deliver a technology product that aligns well to the business need, till date, I'm at a loss understanding features.
Here is a sample scenario and my problem when it comes to eliciting features for a given need:
Company A has a manual process by which they want to automate. The business analyst jumps in, understands the business vision, problem, motivation, and product champions and begins his analysis by understanding the goals of the intended system by either using a user stories or use case approach. Once the analyst distills out the user requirements, the analyst translates those requirements to functional requirements which eventually are designed, developed, tested, and delivered to the customer.
Now, I didn't mention a single statement about designing a product based on a set of features. Although I understand the theory behind how a feature traces up to a business requirement and down to a user requirement, how do I go about actually figuring out 'what the feature is'? I'm so lost.
Lets take a really simple realistic example:
Business Problem: Company A needs to automate the creation of executive reports
High Level Use Cases: "View Executive Report", "View Detailed Company Reports", "Print Reports"
I'll stop here. Now, what would the feature set of this example be? How would I go about eliciting the features for this product? 'When' do we determine the features of the product? Who do we speak to to elicit the feature of the product? Are features of the product the same as the business requirements?
Any help is sincerely appreciated. If you can give me a real example and/or point me to a place that REALLY explains how to determine the features of a product and the relationship of the feature to the business, user, and functional requirements, that'd be very useful! Thanks a lot.