#2 RATIONALE FOR DOCUMENTS: THE 'GUIDELINES-OF-BUSINESS'

The following 'Guidelines-Of-Business' provide an industry-tested foundation for product and project documentation. All of these guidelines are of benefit to the business - in fact some people would maintain that they are "absolutely necessary for a successful business operation".

The 'NO BS' guideline:

Almost every group-of-influence that wants to be assured that your product claims are true and they will require 'the documents that say so': i.e. detailed statements of the claims, methodology of testing the claims and objective test results showing proof of the claims. Some groups, such as large quantity purchasers may do independent testing on your product to validate the product claims. In this case it's extremely important that you have proven the claims too.

The 'HIT BY A TRUCK' guideline:

The product owner needs to retain everything that is known about the product design and its production in case a 'truck hits' the designer / developer or the manufacturer (e.g. they are unceremoniously removed from the development process). The product knowledge base MUST never exist solely in the minds of these individuals. This guide also enables the transfer of knowledge to other team members or to a new team should this ever be necessary.

The 'CROWN JEWELS' guideline:

Documentation is also important for Intellectual Property reasons (patents, trademarks, trade secrets & copyrights), which should be obvious. Proper and complete documentation IS the value of the product (other than market acceptance). Having the physical product itself does not provide the product Owner with a full and complete disclosure of its value. Only a lengthy and costly 'reverse engineering' of the physical product itself could possibly resurrect the value - and this would ultimately end up with documents anyway. This guide is absolutely necessary in case the product rights are licensed, sold or must be argued in a court of law.

The 'VISIBILITY' guideline:

Specific product development documents enhance the flow of project information among the development team members and to pertinent people outside the development team, such as cooperate management, clients, suppliers, regulatory agencies, etc. Software projects especially require visibility, much of which can only be provided by documentation.

The 'TRACEABILITY' guideline:

The creation and maintenance of pertinent documents provides for project and product traceability should there be legal and liability actions that need addressing by the product Owner or manufacturer.

The 'PRODUCTION' guideline:

Manufacturing, QA/QC, services and support live by documentation. Production CAN NOT happen without proper product and production documents.

The 'REFINEMENT' guideline:

The reality of product development requires that ongoing product testing, refining (new features) and maintenance occur while a product is in production and in the market. Refining, testing, debugging and maintenance of a product are greatly enhanced (i.e. easier and more cost effective) if proper design and test documentation exists.

The 'SECURITY' guideline:

Design and security loopholes and product deficiencies can be more efficiently discovered and corrected if complete, pertinent documentation exists. In many cases, the developers are 'long gone' from the project (or company), so documents must be the developers' legacy in this case.

Now that we know that guidelines and groups exist, which will have a direct affect on documentation evolution during product development, let's see exactly what types of documents we're talking about.