Many Agile methodologies seek to minimize the role of traditional requirements in application development, preferring to rely upon a combination of user stories and the source code itself for documentation of business and non-functional requirements.

The criticism that formal requirements are often out-of-date or unnecessary is legitimate, but that doesn't mean that the act of creating and managing project requirements should be abandoned completely. A well-maintained requirements document does not hinder other good Agile practices, including the incorporation of user stories and feedback to the Agile team. In particular, more formal requirements are objective and measurable through testing, enabling Agile teams and the product owners to determine whether or not they have been met. In many cases, requirements are necessitated by the customer or by government regulations covering development processes.

This presentation describes how to effectively use requirements with your existing user stories to improve your ability to validate features and more confidently push each iteration out to your users, while maintaining team agility. It demonstrates that Agile practices and requirements can work together to enable more seamless testing while providing for easy assessment and change during Agile projects.