Work Product

The work product of an activity is the essential outcome of the activity; what the customer (or whoever) ultimately desires and what authorities mandate. (By "authority", I mean external authorities outside the control of the organization; just because some manager has a process requiring a certain document for internal consumption; doesn't elevate that document to WorkProduct).

In many software projects, the work product consists of working, functional software (deployed in whatever manner) that does what the customer wants. Many customers don't care about UnitTests, design documents, version control archives, defect tracking records, QA logs, schedules, etc. (But some do, in which case these items become WorkProduct and should be enumerated in the requirements).

Production of things other than the WorkProduct should, in general, only be done if they assist the team in developing the WorkProduct. Anything else is wasting time and money.

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