The title of one of the initial chapters of the book “Agile Software Requirements” by Dean Leffingwell is “The Big Picture of Agile Requirements”. This emphasizes that agile requirements are more than user stories on a small card. In this book, Dean Leffingwell presents the big picture of agile requirements, together with the small details that can help you write better user stories. He also discusses the interesting concept of the Agile Release Train (ART) that aggregates user stories in features set.
Dean Leffingwell defines a three levels view to manage requirements : portfolio, program and team. The book contains many case studies, templates and sample agenda that help relate the ideas expressed with the daily activities. Three appendixes at the end propose interviews and document templates, along with a release-planning checklist. This book provides a detailed and extensive study of the agile gathering and management of requirements in organizations and I will recommend it to everybody involved in some software projects, from the business analyst to the project manager or developer.
Reference: “Agile Software Requirements”, Dean Leffingwell, Addison-Wesley, 489 pages, IBSN 978-0-321-63584-6
