Write better acceptance criteria.

This skill goes a long way towards solving problems before they begin.

Learning to write good acceptance criteria can be challenging, but there are ways to make it easier. Start by writing them in simple English. Acceptance criteria should be easy to understand, without any technical jargon. Use the terminology from the business domain.

The benefits of having good acceptance criteria are long-lasting. Not only will it save countless hours of development time and rework, but it can also prevent frustrating bugs that often result from the misunderstanding of vague requirements. As a result, the return on investment in the effort is too high to ignore. So it certainly pays to take the extra time necessary to develop a robust set of requirements.

Well-defined acceptance criteria can also uncover mission requirement details that could delay a project. Too often, developers overlook essential features because the initial requirements were not crystal clear.

All too often, the difference between a high-performing team and a typical one comes down to the requirements given to the developers.

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