How Understanding Business Requirements and Sanity Checks Prevent Post-Release Failures

By Mon Luong, Test Lead at Groove Technology

Software failures don’t always originate from coding errors. More often, they stem from misunderstood requirements, misaligned expectations, or missing validation steps before deployment. According to a report from IBM, software defects detected in production environments cost up to 100 times more to fix than those found earlier. On top of that, around 80% of defects arise from miscommunication or incomplete understanding of business needs.

At Groove Technology, we’ve found that two critical practices can significantly reduce these risks:
✅ Deep understanding of business requirements
✅ Lightweight yet powerful sanity checks before every release

In this blog, I’ll walk you through real stories from our projects to show how these two practices work in tandem—and why both are essential to any strong QA strategy.

01. Understanding Business Requirements: The First Line of Defense

One of the most overlooked but impactful aspects of software testing is the early alignment with business logic. A system may behave correctly from a functional standpoint, but if it doesn’t fulfill the business purpose, it’s still a failure.

Here’s a real-world example from our team:

When building a new user interface (UI) for the translation project within our team, we initially had no UI to interact with. Instead, we relied solely on APIs to add, update, or delete translation bundles in the system, which would then display the translated text on various UI widgets in different languages. However, interacting through APIs had certain limitations and was not easily accessible for end users. Therefore, we decided to develop a project with a dedicated UI.

At the initial stage, the requirements were quite general and not yet detailed. We held several meetings with the Product Owner (PO) and the client to understand their expectations. Additionally, we compared the new requirements with the existing system to align the logic and UI properly. Furthermore, we aimed to introduce additional features to enhance user convenience in managing data.

The entire team, including developers, business analysts (BA), designers, and QA, collaborated through multiple discussions to finalize the requirements and create a design prototype. This ensured that the implementation met the requirements, covered all possible scenarios, and aligned with the technical development. With a well-clarified process, the implementation progressed smoothly between developers and QA, while the PO was able to closely track the project’s progress.

• Adding and modifying translation bundles for different languages
• Support import data via several ways and formats
• Provide publish functions to any environment user wanting to
• Tracking and easy to manage data
• Easy integrate with other system

Thanks to a clear and well-defined process, the implementation progressed efficiently. Developers and QA worked seamlessly together, while the PO closely tracked the project’s status to ensure alignment with business goals.

Testing was conducted effectively, covering all major use cases and edge cases. Development stayed on schedule, and we successfully released the first MVP version within just one month. The new UI significantly improved the translation workflow, making it more user-friendly and efficient for non-technical users.

02. Applying Sanity Checks: A Quick Safety Net Before Going Live

Even when individual features pass their functional tests, combining them can introduce new risks. Sanity testing helps us ensure core workflows are still intact after changes—before the release hits production.

Here’s how we apply sanity checks in real projects:

Imagine our team is preparing for a new release that includes multiple updates, such as new features, bug fixes, and technical refactoring. Although each change has been tested individually during development, once all code is merged into the main branch, there is always a risk of conflicts or unintended impacts on existing functionalities.

To prevent unexpected failures, our QA team do sanity testing:

• Selects a must-have test case list, covering the system’s core functionalities.
• Checks key scenarios for newly implemented features to ensure they work as expected.
• Verifies dependencies between different modules, ensuring that refactored components do not break existing workflows.

In some cases, we have encountered issues such as:

• Missing configurations after merging new implementations.
• New database tables not being pre-created, causing errors in production.
• Existing functions breaking due to new improvements impacting them unexpectedly.

Since we caught this issue early, our developers quickly fixed it before the release went live.

By applying a sanity check, we ensured that:

✅ No critical functionality was broken.

✅ New features worked correctly.

✅ The release was stable before going live.

03. The Critical Link: Why Business Understanding and Sanity Testing Must Go Together

From my experience, the most costly post-release issues often occur when these two elements—requirements understanding and sanity checks—are treated in isolation.

For instance, early in my career, I worked on a financial analytics platform where the reports were mistakenly configured to generate per transaction instead of daily, simply because the business expectation wasn’t clarified. Functional tests passed, but we missed the purpose. This reinforced the need to involve QA early and validate not just technical correctness, but also business intent.

When sanity testing is aligned with business workflows—not just system logic—it becomes far more effective. At Groove, we always prioritize sanity checks around high-impact workflows, such as real-time sensor sync in manufacturing dashboards or form submissions tied to backend validations. This alignment ensures we're not just testing code—we’re safeguarding business operations.

04. Lessons Learned: My Approach to Minimizing Release Risk

Through years of leading QA efforts across enterprise systems, I’ve learned that:

• Misunderstood requirements are often more dangerous than code defects.
• Sanity testing is the fastest way to catch high-risk issues before release.
• Combining both practices leads to fewer surprises, better stakeholder confidence, and more stable products.

At Groove Technology, we’ve reduced post-release failures by nearly 50% on projects where both business alignment and sanity checks were tightly integrated into the QA strategy.

05. Final Thoughts: Your Next Step Toward Reliable Delivery

Whether you’re managing a complex enterprise platform or rolling out a new MVP, don’t underestimate these two low-cost, high-return practices. When you align QA efforts with business intent and validate them through sanity testing, you’re building with clarity and stability.

If you're looking to strengthen your QA process or reduce software failures, reach out to us at contact@groovetechnology.com. We're here to help.

Mon Luong is a Test Lead at Groove Technology, specializing in risk-based testing, system migrations, and optimizing QA strategies for enterprise applications.