Product Requirements Document (Pragmatic Framework: Planning)

A PRD here is a market requirements document — it specifies the WHAT (the market problems, personas, and prioritized requirements). The HOW (design, flows, UI, prototypes, error conditions) belongs to the team. Lead with the problem, cite evidence, and write problems in the persona's first-person voice. See ../pm-copilot/references/framework.md for the primitives used below.

Requirement form: [persona] has [problem, described in a use scenario] with [frequency]. Priority = Market Evidence × Impact (advanced: × (B + U + C + V) — Buying, Using, Vision, Competitive).

Reuse what already exists

Before gathering inputs, find or resume the feature dossier as described in ../pm-copilot/references/artifact-output.md ("Find or resume the feature dossier" and "Reuse prior artifacts"): look for the feature folder (or NN-*.md files, or artifacts earlier in this conversation) and reuse their personas, problems, positioning statement, and prioritized requirements — don't duplicate work, and carry their open caveats forward. If nothing exists yet, gather inline (or offer to run pm-personas, pm-market-problems, pm-requirements, pm-use-scenarios first).

Interview the user (batch questions)

1. Product & release — name, version, and the goal of this release.
2. Market forces — what's driving this now? Is it content-driven (ship when the problems are solved) or target-date-driven (a fixed market window)?
3. Personas — who is the buyer, who is the user? (summarize or link)
4. Top market problems — in the persona's first person, each with evidence (interview count, % of customers, win/loss, support tickets, usage data).
5. Success metrics — how will you know it worked? (Value / Quality / Progress / Satisfaction)
6. Out of scope, dependencies, risks.

Artifact template

# Product Requirements Document — <Product> <Version>

*Confidential and subject to change. For internal use only. No external commitments
can be made based on this document since it is in early planning stages. Content and
timing are very likely to change.*

**Company:** <company>  ·  **Feature / Product:** <feature / product name>
**Author:** <author>  ·  **Contact:** <email>  ·  **Date created:** <date>  ·  **Version:** 1.0

## 1. Overview of the target release
Goal of this release: <one paragraph>.
Market forces driving it: <evidence-backed forces>.
Driven primarily by: <content | target date>. Target window: <date/quarter>.
Related artifacts: <positioning doc, roadmap, canvas, links>.

## 2. Personas
### Buyer persona — <name>
<motivations, buying process, barriers>
### User persona — <name>
<goals, behaviors, problems>

## 3. Market problems (persona's first person, with evidence)
- "<I can't …>" — evidence: <n interviews / % customers / win-loss>
- "<It takes too long to …>" — evidence: <…>

## 4. Requirements (grouped, prioritized)
### GROUP 1 — <group name>
1. **<Requirement>** — <Persona> has <problem, in a use scenario> with <frequency>.
   Priority: <evidence> (inputs) × <impact> (impact) = **<priority>**.
2. **<Requirement>** — … Priority: … = **<priority>**.
### GROUP 2 — <group name>
1. …

## 5. Use scenarios (day-in-the-life)
**<Scenario name>** — <Persona> is trying to <goal>. Today, <what happens, the pain,
the current workaround>. This happens <frequency>. <Why it matters.>

## 6. Requirements summary
| Requirement | Persona | Market Evidence | Impact | Priority | Group | Group Order |
| :--- | :--- | ---: | ---: | ---: | :--- | ---: |
| <name> | <persona> | 25 | 4 | 100 | <group> | 1 |

## 7. Out of scope / non-goals
- <explicitly not doing …>

## 8. Success metrics
| Metric category | Metric | Current | Goal |
| :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- |
| Value | <LTV / revenue> | | |
| Quality | <defects / coverage> | | |
| Progress | <cycle time> | | |
| Satisfaction | <NPS / CSAT / renewal> | | |

## 9. Dependencies & risks
- <dependency / risk> — <mitigation>

## 10. Approvals
| Name | Title | Date | Signature |
| :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- |
| | Product Manager | | |
| | Systems Architect | | |
| | Development Manager | | |
| | Interaction Designer | | |
| | QA Lead | | |

## 11. Change tracking
| Version | Date | Changes | Reason |
| :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- |
| 1.0 | <date> | Initial draft | |

## Open questions / evidence to gather
- > TODO: <unproven claim or missing evidence>

Deliver the artifact

Follow ../pm-copilot/references/artifact-output.md: confirm inputs (fill gaps with clearly-marked assumptions rather than inventing evidence), ask Markdown or .docx, write the .md, convert to .docx on request via your environment's native document-creation capability. Then offer the next stage: turn the prioritized requirements into a committed pm-release-plan, and set up pm-stakeholder-communication to keep everyone aligned.