Effective BRD: How to Write Documentation Your Team Will Actually Use

A BRD doesn't have to be a forgotten tome. Discover how to structure it so that it's useful, clear, and actionable for both stakeholders and the technical team.

Most teams have been there: a BRD (Business Requirements Document) that’s painfully long, full of jargon, shared once, and then left to gather dust in a forgotten Drive folder. But it doesn’t have to be that way. A good BRD can be a living tool that connects business needs with the work of the technical and product teams.

The key is to stop treating the BRD as a rigid contract and start seeing it as a map of context and objectives. It should be clear enough to align stakeholders, but also concise and practical enough for the team to reference in day-to-day work.

Instead of focusing on length, focus on structure. An effective BRD should answer three big questions:

• What problem are we solving, and why does it matter? – business context, expected impact, success metrics.
• Who are we solving it for? – a quick description of the user or customer, their needs, and pain points.
• What constraints and criteria must we consider? – scope, dependencies, legal or technical limitations.

Once the essentials are covered, everything else can live as supporting material. This keeps the main document short, clear, and actionable.

Format also matters. A BRD doesn’t have to be a static PDF — it can live in a collaborative tool like Confluence, Notion, or Google Docs, where it’s easy to update and comment on. Simple visuals — flow diagrams, screenshots, or wireframes — make the content more digestible and engaging.

In short: an effective BRD isn’t measured by page count but by how much it facilitates collaboration and decision-making. If your team actually refers back to it and stakeholders can understand it without extra explanation, then your BRD has done its job.