What is a Subject Matter Expert?
Subject matter experts really fall into a few categories. The first category is the business owner who initiates the development process. For internal development this might be the manager who is sponsoring the project. For external development projects it might be the customer paying the bills. For software development companies the SMEs are most often the users of the software who understand what the product is supposed to do the most or at the very least what the product is expected to do. SMEs provide all of the raw material for the development process this includes the requirements for the system and how it will be used. Their input describes the problem or the opportunity that the software solution will ultimately solve. Who is a Subject Matter Expert? SMEs are perhaps the most broadly described part of the development process. Because they can come from all walks of life, all levels of awareness of the software development process, and all levels of interest, trying to describe
