“Read the functional analysis,” ‘it is written in the comment on jira,’ ‘why didn't you write it?’ are some of the sentences that gave the figure of communication within a development team. Incidentally (?) the team was composed of sub-teams from different companies. Analysts and developers appeared to be in conflict and, as a result, it seemed impossible to do planning or proceed constructively to resolve difficulties.
Both sub-teams were entrenched behind formalities (e.g., analysis documents) or technical jargon that hid either mutual distrust.

The strategy used to overcome the state of affairs saw the backlog as the central element. The backlog was used, and structured, as a pure communication tool and not as a to-do list, or a list of specifications.

To avoid opening discussions to potentially divisive, if not irrelevant, details, the backlog was generated, on purpose, at a high level, not particularly detailed.
The reason lies in the goal of improving communication. The backlog was used as a diversion, something “third party” that could be attacked without attacking the other parties. Within a few sessions we were able to shift the conversation from the people to the problem, find then, almost unconsciously, the space for collaboration.