A colleague’s statement, “In fact my tip is NEVER do a MoSCoW prioritisation,” caught my eye. “The implied fixing of scope makes change very difficult. Order things instead.” That bold NEVER waves a red flag. The following exhortation to order the things to do is also troubling to me.

I don’t know what prompted the statement. I can certainly envision situations where I think the advice to order requirements or backlog items, rather than prioritize them in buckets, makes very good sense. There are other situations where MoSCoW prioritization (“Must have,” “Should have,” “Could have,” & “Won’t have) is good enough, and situations where linear ordering is inadequate. Let’s look at it more closely… Read More