Evaluation of Visual ConOps in Early Solution Validation in a Small and Medium‐sized Enterprise.

This paper focuses on the design, implementation, and assessment of the visual Concept of Operations (ConOps) as an informal visualization technique employed for early solution validation in Small and Medium‐sized Enterprises (SMEs). SMEs face significant challenges in early solution validation due to the complex nature of modern systems and the constantly changing market demands. These challenges may be further intensified by immature leadership and ineffective communication within the organization. By applying an industry‐as‐laboratory approach in an SME industry case, this study aims to reduce the negative impacts of miscommunication between internal and external stakeholders and contribute to needs elicitation and system validation process. The results show that visual ConOps can effectively support the need elicitation process, which is crucial for early validation, however, it may not independently serve as a comprehensive communication tool between the developer team and stakeholders. It is essential to supplement visual ConOps with complementary tools to effectively convey stakeholder input to the developer team. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]