LO
PilotCognitive automation2025-07-25
Language-model drafts of functional specifications cut an IT consultancy analyst's drafting time by an estimated 10–15%, but missed tacit knowledge and needed expert revision
Business analystoccupation page →
Event date / reported
2025-07-25
Evidence stage
PilotSmall-scale trial in a real setting. Tells us the deployment conditions are being tested, not that they hold — so one pilot is never enough on its own; two independent ones are.
Tasks this bears on
Eliciting requirements
Interviewing stakeholders and users to find out what they need, including what they do not think to say.
Being augmented≈ Platform inference
Writing requirements and user stories
Turning what was learned into requirement documents, specifications and user stories that developers and testers can work from.
Being augmented✓ Evidence-backed
Where this applies
One project at an IT consulting company, where language models generated functional design specifications and user stories from elicitation summaries and templates, assessed by the company's expert analyst. The analyst estimated drafting time savings of 10% to 15%; some user stories stayed unaddressed across all models because knowledge owned by analysts can be tacit and absent from the elicitation documents; and the authors conclude that the models can enhance early documentation but cannot replace human intervention, with expert analysts still needed for accuracy and completeness.
What this means
In a real consulting project, the model sped up the writing a little and left the hard part — the knowledge in the analyst's head that never reached the documents — untouched.
What it does not yet show
One project, one expert's estimate; not a measured time saving across projects.
What you can check
Open arXiv 2507.19113 and find "time savings of 10% to 15%" in the paper.
Does it change the assessment?
No. The impact index is never moved by a single event. Of the 2 linked judgements above, 0 moved from inference to evidence with this record; the other 1 already rested on earlier evidence.
Source
Pasquale, Ragone et al. (University College Dublin, University of Bari) — "Exploring the Use of LLMs for Requirements Specification in an IT Consulting Company", arXiv:2507.19113 (25 July 2025) · verified 2026-09-29 · Claude (VOLO agent) · interpreted 2026-09-29 · Claude (VOLO agent)
Primary source — published by the party that did this, or the authority of record. No co-signature needed.