Deliverables? (was Re: [Sigia-l] "Team work" not what's cracked up to be?

[andrew at humaneia.com]

Quoting Ziya Oz <listera at earthlink.net>:

>
> For anybody outside the "team," it's extremely difficult to deconstruct the
> (consensus-making) process with fidelity. At most organizations, the urge to
> arrive at that compromise you refer to pretty much overwhelms all other
> considerations. Clues are scattered all over the place: emails, meeting
> minutes, presentations, etc. What's missing is a formalized method to
> preserve majority/minority or compromise/dissention opinions and arguments.

Hi Ziya,

surely you aren't saying here that there needs to be a set of design 
meeting minutes, position papers, review meeting minutes, design 
decision logs, interaction standards documents, requirements management 
systems/documentation, strategy documentation, high level/low level 
design documentation, logistic support planning documentation, and the 
plethora of other tree-wasters that are the standard deliverables in 
some organisations? :)

The highest art may be to sidestep such things, but if they are a 
political necessity, they can be used by the clever designer to record 
all sorts of things - such as opinions and arguments. No one wants 
their project to fail, but if it does, it is better to not be left 
holding the baby. Such things are also useful at implementation time 
(when the designer may or may not be long gone) for when the inevitable 
"Why are we doing it this way?" questions are asked.

Cheers, Andrew

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