Review Working Software

Working-software review lets business stakeholders evaluate the behavior they will actually use. It can reveal misunderstandings earlier and more clearly than a long description of hypothetical interactions. The Product Engineer translates feedback into agreed decisions and maintains the specification corpus accordingly.

Responsible role: Product Engineer.
Participants: Business stakeholders, intended users, UX designer as relevant; coding agent for subsequent changes.
Inputs: Working product increment, related feature specifications, objectives, known limitations, representative scenarios.
Outputs: Confirmed behaviors, recorded defects and usability issues, agreed specification changes, and prioritized follow-up work.

1. Choose meaningful scenarios. Ask stakeholders to attempt actual tasks rather than merely commenting on an interface's appearance. Include common workflows and important exceptions.

2. State the current boundary. Explain what functionality is ready, which decisions remain open, and what is explicitly out of scope for the review. Do not misrepresent an unfinished implementation as complete.

3. Observe before interpreting. Watch where users hesitate, choose an unexpected path, or encounter an error. Ask what result they expected. A complaint may expose a missing requirement, a usability problem, or an implementation defect.

4. Classify feedback. Distinguish (a) behavior that contradicts the current specification, (b) a previously unstated business rule, (c) a usability improvement, (d) a new requested feature, and (e) a defect outside the reviewed scope.

5. Confirm decisions. Obtain appropriate stakeholder agreement on changes to business behavior. Record the accepted change in the relevant specification. Consult UX or the architect when the change affects experience patterns or technical boundaries.

6. Implement and return. Direct the coding agent to make the agreed change, evaluate the working result, and repeat review as necessary. Maintain a clear account of what is done and what still requires attention.

Stakeholders have evaluated representative working flows; feedback is categorized and dispositioned; agreed behavioral changes appear in specifications; and the product is ready to proceed to independent verification when iteration has converged sufficiently.

Treating every suggestion as immediate scope; allowing UX issues to become contradictory business requirements; editing code without updating maintained specifications; and replacing stakeholder feedback with agent-generated confidence summaries.