Requirements vs. Features – Which is Best For You?

While there are many different ways to design and build a product or solution, one thing remains the same no matter what you are building – you need to have requirements!

Two of the most popular approaches for organizing product requirements and design are Requirements Driven Development (RDD) and Feature Driven Development (FDD). Which might be best for you? Let’s take a quick look at the differences and see which makes more sense for your project.

 

  Requirements Driven Development Feature Driven Development
General Characteristics High-level, non-prescriptive Varying degrees of detail

 

Focus Area Product attributes Product functionality
Perspective Product or solution End-user point of view
Benefits / Advantages May be developed without customer input;

Potentially less cost/effort to develop

Derived from user perspective;

More likely to meet customer desired experience;

Provides more opportunity for innovation

Risks / Disadvantages Potential to build a product that does not support user objectives;

Less freedom to innovate and/or experiment with new solutions

May require more time to develop due to customer collaboration;