Clearly describe any deliverables related to an agreement to support shared understanding of expectations.

A deliverable is a product, service, component or material provided to fulfill a requirement.

When describing deliverables:

  • include the necessary amount of detail
  • reference other documents when helpful or necessary

Explicitly describing deliverables can be useful for improving communication and collaboration within the organization, with customer and with external partners.

Example: A popular way to describe deliverables in software-engineering are so-called user stories, which focus on the need of users in relation to a software system. User stories are developed in dialogue between a customer (or their representative, the product manager or “product owner”), and the software developer(s). What is written down is usually one sentence to remind the team of the user need, and acceptance criteria, a list of requirements for the new feature, which the customer will then use in a review meeting to decide whether or not they accept the new feature as delivered.