Confession: I Used to Think Specs Were Everything. Agile Broke Me (and Made Me Better)

When I started out as a BA, we were taught to treat documentation like gospel. But in an Agile world, usefulness doesn’t come from a polished doc. What they needed was me, in the room, talking with them.

There was a time I believed that if I just wrote a perfect spec—everything would go smoothly.

The devs would build exactly what I envisioned.

QA wouldn’t miss a thing.

The product owner would nod in agreement, and we’d launch on time.

That fantasy lasted about two sprints.

I Was Trained to Believe Specs Were Sacred

Back when I started out as a BA, we were taught to treat documentation like gospel.

You wrote it all down—every scenario, exception, flow, dropdown option, tooltip. The longer the spec, the more “complete” it was. If it made it to 20 pages? Even better ...