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Introduction

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titleSection Explanation. Click to expand.readme

The product requirements document (PRD) is a central document used to align all stakeholders (product management, engineering, QA, designers, and leadership) on how we will solve a specific problem with the proposed solution.

When creating the PRD, provide just as much information as needed and nothing more. If the document is too long and complex, it will quickly become outdated, and readers will lose interest.In this latest iteration of the Unified Compliance PRD template, we changed the template to help raise visibility of how the proposed product (or feature set) adheres to Unified Compliance’s strategic plan including details on why this product proposal is important to Unified Compliance.

Strategic Planning and Decision Making

  • Vision and Goal Setting: articulates the vision alignment, problem being addressed, and goals of the product proposal describing what the product is, who it is for, and how it will benefit the users and the organization.

  • Decision-Making Framework: helps in making informed decisions throughout the product development process acting as a reference point for evaluating progress and making changes.

  • Performance Measurement: sets the criteria for measuring the success of the product through specified metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) including potential financial impact.

  • Basis for Prioritization: helps in prioritizing features based on the product strategy, market needs, and resource constraints
    Expand
    titleSection Explanation. Click to expand.
    readme

    Describe the problem we are solving, the high-level approach, and goals so that before we get too far into the details, readers will have a good understand of where we are headed.

    Expand
    titleThe Problem

    What problem are we trying to solve? and why it important to our customers and/or to Unified Compliance?


    We currently rely on a team of expert mappers to meticulously add content into the UCF. The process works well but is slow. With the advent of automation and AI, Unified Compliance risks attacks from competitors who will use technology to accelerate content acquisition.We risk losing customers to other platforms if we fall behind on the extent of

    coverageCustomers are not able keep up to date with compliance requirements in the face of the quickly evolving best practices, implementation guide, new segments, etc.

    We will also find it difficult to take on new market segments without automation.

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    titleHigh-level Approach

    Briefly describe the approach you’re taking to solve this problem. Provide enough information for the reader to imagine possible solution directions and get a rough sense of the scope of this proposal.


    The approach is to start with the “left-hand” side of the end-to-end content ingestion process focusing on compliance content through ETL for an identified list of four (4) compliance content providers.

    For each content provider, Authority Documents will be identified, then Citations and Glossaries will be extracted from the Authority Documents, transformed into the Common Data Format specification, and loaded into the UC platform.

    Automation tools and AI will be used to accelerate the end-to-end process with human assistance to review and approve critical steps in the process focusing on reviewing and updating AI suggestions.

    Once the process is proven out, the intent is to extend the solution to many additional compliance content providers.

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    titleGoals

    What does success look like? What metrics do we measure today that we can we effect and why affect? What metrics should we absolutely add? Why it is important to affect those metrics?

    Expand
    titleSection Explanation. Click to expand.

    The intent of this section is for the following:

    Scope Definition: defines the scope of the proposed product (or features), including what will and will not be included helping manage expectations and focus development efforts.

    Guideline for Development: provides detailed information on the product’s features, functionalities, user flow, and interface to guide the development team in building the product

    Goal

    Metric

    Why Important?

    Reliably extract citations from Authority Documents>=

    When AI is not needed, 100% accuracy.

    When AI is utilized, greater than 80% accuracy where 20% of Citations need to be reworked (e.g., split, merged, rejected …)

    If there is poor accuracy requiring extensive human correction, then there is little value.

    Reliably extract glossaries from Authority Documents

    >= 95% When AI is not needed, 100% accuracy.

    When AI is utilized, greater than 80% accuracy where only 5% 20% of term-definition pairs need to be reworked. Glossaries are substantially easier to identify and extract than citations.

    If there is poor accuracy requiring extensive human correction, then there is little value.

    Reliably automate the end-to-end process of capturing, transforming, and loading STIG, NIST 800-53, FedRAMP, eCFR compliance content into the Unified Compliance platform.

    100% of identified Authority Documents for all four compliance content contributor sources is loaded into the UCF.

    All four Authority Documents sources are related to securing and hardening IT infrastructure for both the private and public sector.

    To provide value to customers with Security Operation's requirements, UC needs to maximize the breadth of security coverage to ensure we can provide security guidance for as many IT assets as possible.

    Scope and Features

    Ingested compliance content, including Authority Documents, Citations, and Glossaries, are available for access via the UC 4.0 API Gateway

    100% of identified Authority Documents for all four compliance content contributor sources are available for access via the UCF 4.0 API Gateway

    We are in the migration phase from CCH to UC 4.0. To ensure we don’t elongate the migration process, all new content must come into UC 4.0 and out the API Gateway.

    Reliably catalog Authority Documents, track versions, and detect changes

    100% of all identified Authority Documents from the four (4) source sites are automatically cataloged with 0 documents moving further into the pipeline if no metadata changes are detected.

    Before context is extracted, the Authority Documents must be inventoried, cataloged, and only reprocessed if changes are detected to reduce expensive AI processing resources.

    Scope and Features

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    titlereadme

    The section focusses on the details of the solution including what is in scope, what is out of scope and additional information to help in the product and engineering collaboration process.

    Expand
    titleFeatures

    Describe the product features that will bring value to customers and fulfill underserved need(s).

    Feature

    Use Case / Problem Solved

    Automatic Citation and Glossary Extraction from Authority Documents

    Out of all the ancillary information found in Authority Documents, specific passages containing Mandates (requirements) and related contextual information such as stubs, informational, and informational gathering are extracted from the Authority Documents.

    Human-in-the-loop Training for Content Extraction AI Models

    Expert mappers can validate and make changes about the correctness of the AI-driven Citation and Glossary extraction helping train the AI model to produce increasingly better results.

    Automated Compliance Content Ingestion into the Common Data Format

    Authority Documents (initially targeted for STIGs, NIST 800-53, FedRAMP, and eCFR) are loaded into the UCF platform with minimal human intervention.

    Monitoring and Logging

    Administrators can make informed decisions and take action on the ingestion process based on meaningful information that is collected throughout compliance content ingestion process.

    Metadata and Data Change Detection

    Compliance professionals are kept to up to date with changes made by compliance content providers.

    Statistical Data Capture and Reporting

    Product and engineering teams can review statistical results captured during the document ingestion process to help make objective data-driven decisions about the accuracy and effectiveness off the process automation.

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    titleOut of Scope / Future Functionality

    List the known features that are out of scope for this project or might be revisited at a later time.

    As is case with the assumptions, it is important to list these out so that architects and engineers can plan accordingly for these later updates.

    Link to mockups, prototypes, or screenshots related to the requirements

    Feature

    Comments

    Tagging and Mapping of content to the Common Controls.

    This project ends at the AD, Citation and Glossary extraction, transformation, and load.

    Follow-on projects will include the tagging and mapping.

    Human-in-the-loop for content capture.

    Later projects can include additional human validation. To limit scope of this project, steps such as metadata change detection can be reviewed and validated after the fact looking at logs and other information.

    Human-in-the-loop for the AD cataloging.

    Same as above

    Human-in-the-loop for transformation into the common data format

    Same as above

    Human-in-the-loop for loading into the UCF

    Same as above

    Corpora Management and Administration

    A non-production version of a corpora exists. Any work on the corpora is out of scope for this product.

    Corpora Data Loads

    The focus of this PRD is to load compliance content into the UCF 4.0 application for customer consumption over the API Gateway with API Responses in the Common Data Format.

    Follow-on projects can tap into the pipeline and use the content for other purposes.

    Fit-for-purpose frontend for each step in the content ingestion process.

    UX/UI for any other aspect of the process outside of human review and approval of suggested citations and suggested term-definition pairs.

    Later product updates could include additional front-end steps for tasks throughout the process.

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    titleUser Interaction and Design

    Dictionary term management.

    For

    this PRD, the focus of the user interaction is on the reviewing of suggested citations and

    glossaries, all that is needed for the terms is the term-definition

    pairs.

    pair. Once we move into creating and managing dictionaries, we will add more details like part of speech, synonyms …

    Links to
    Expand
    titleProcess Flow Diagrams
    flows and UX

    If we have them, link to:

    • user journeys, process flow, or other diagrams related to the requirements.

    • mockups, prototypes, or screenshots related to the requirements.


    Link here:
    Expand
    titleImpacted Product Components

    If this project is a component to other areas or an update to an existing product, specifically call out where this product will interact with other areas.


    Start writing here:
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    titleOpen Questions

    List any open questions that come to mind throughout the lifecycle of this initiative.

    Question

    Answer

    Date Answered

    What do we do with deprecated authority documents?

    How do we identify and capture AD versions?

    For STIGs, how do we identify which files are authority documents?

    For NIST 800-53, how do we identify which files are authority documents?

    For FedRAMP, how do we identify which files are authority documents?

    For eCFRs, how do we identify which files are authority documents?

    Specifically, what is required to catalog an AD?

    In this first pass, what should constitute content changes?

    We don’t want to get too crazy and make this a massive project.

    Need to discuss.

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    titleAlternative Solutions
    Provide a high-level evaluation criterion for alternative solutions (build, buy, partner) to evaluate different routes to success

    .

    Milestones and Launch Checklist

    What is the Unique Selling Proposition (USP)? Relay the key factors that separate our product from the competition and why we are the best possible solution for our prospects based on their unique needs.

    Expand
    titleSection Explanation. Click to expand.readme
    Expand
    titleRisk Mitigation

    The intent of this section is for the following:

    Monetization: Financial impact this product will introduce (if any)

    Risk Mitigation: Identifies potential risks and propose mitigation strategies.

    Launch Readiness: launch checklist including high-level go-to-market plan to ensure cross-departmental alignment.

    High-level Messaging: Includes Unique Selling Proposition (USP) raising visibility of the proposed solution’s value proposition.

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    titleHigh-level Messaging
    Expand
    titleMonetization

    Will this product be part of an existing subscription or an add-on?

    Will this product be usage based or part of a subscription?

    Identifies potential mostly focused on getting the solution “out the door” and who else is affected outside the product and engineering teams.

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    titleTechnical Risk Mitigation

    If applicable, identifies potential technical risks and propose mitigation strategies.

    Risk

    Mitigation Strategy

    The eCFR content volume could cause multiple challenges including impact on API responses, searches, dominate other content sources …

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    titleLaunch Readiness

    Identify any relevant milestones that people should now know about. Will we “eat it” ourselves first? Will this require a beta? and what is the target launch date?

    Date

    Milestone

    Audience

    Description

    TBD

    Dogfood 🐶

    Internal employees only.

    Testing internally

    TBD

    Beta 🎈

    Early cohort of X customers.

    Getting user feedback

    TBD

    Public Launch 🚀

    Roll-out to all users.

    Let’s do it!

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    titleLaunch Checklist

    This section is a reminder to the product team to make sure all relevant stakeholders are involved as necessary.

    Area

    Question

    Answer (yes/no)

    Instructions if "Yes” (or unsure)

    Product

    Are we introducing new functionality that requires changes to the pricing implementation.

     Yes

    The expectation is that these changes are part of the features in the PRD.

    Customer Success

    Will new training material be needed (or updates to existing classes)? 

     No

    Talk to the Customer Success team.

    Customer Success

    Do we need a new or updated onboarding experience?

    No

    Talk to the Customer Success team.

    Support

    Will new FAQs be required (or updates to existing ones)? API documentation?

    Yes

    Talk to the Customer Support team.

    Support

    Will this functionality require new support processes like new HubSpot workflows or saved replies? Or training the support team on the product?

    Yes

    Talk to the Support team.

    Growth & Data

    Do we need additional tracking in order to measure success and impact on user behavior for the new feature? Will UserFlow be used? Do we need a new Power BI report?

    Yes

    Review within our Product Team

    Growth & Data

    Could this impact CTAs? Or new-user-experience (NUX)?

     Yes

    Review within our Product Team

    Growth & Data

    Are we turning this product or feature on for everyone immediately or are we going to use feature flags for a slow roll-out?

    Everyone

    Not applicable yet until feature flags are ready to go

    Product

    Are we running a Beta for this?

    No

    Review within our Product Team

    Marketing

    Are we introducing functionality where we will want to update or create new web pages? New/updated CTAs?

    Yes

    Talk with Marketing

    Additional References

    Expand
    titleSection Explanation. Click to expand.additional references

    List and link to any other reference sites, documents … that might be important to the reader including the business model canvas (BMC).


    STIG Overview

    STIG Document Library

    NIST SP 800-53 Overview

    NIST GitHub Repository

    FedRAMP Basics

    FedRAMP GitHub Repository

    eCFR Overview

    eCFR Developer Resources

    eCFR XML User Guide

    eCFR API Documentation