Faster! Faster!

Midwestern metropolis. Scheduled weekly meeting for a case management implementation project ($10 mln.) for a local government.

Regional VP (Peter) is going over the milestones timeline.
Peter: "Reporting piece… Why are your requirements scheduled to be completed after the system design?!"
Stan, "In order for me to gather reporting requirements, I need to be able to point to some data elements on the forms. We'll end up spending much more time on reporting requirements if we start before nailing down the system design."
Peter, "We can't wait till the design is done. We need to push the reporting piece up. Work in parallel."
Stan, "... but what data fields can I reference if the forms design isn't complete and the data structures are undefined?"
Peter, "Just ask them what general queries they plan to run, and document that. It's a moving target; you'll have to revisit it once the design is done."
Stan, "…so we won't be able to have a complete document ('or anything semi-intelligent for that matter', to himself) until we finish system design anyway; why not wait a little and do it right in one sweep? It'll be faster and more efficient."
Peter, "We can't wait that long - we're on a tight budget."
Stan (after looking blankly at Peter), "OK, sir. I'll move up the reporting requirements deliverable to coincide with the deliverable of the system design."
Peter, "No. Move it up even earlier, you'll have some free cycles there."
Stan, "OK. Will do."

15 minutes later Stan delivered a new timeline where the completion of the reporting requirements was scheduled to precede that of the system requirements.

Long live productivity!