Ron Moore, the man who was a longstanding Star Trek writer before he rebooted Battlestar Galactica, once explained the frustration of creating stories in the Star Trek universe:
I have read more than once about how a writer will ignore canon in favor of a good story and I can understand the frustration. On the other hand, I can also appreciate how canon describes the world in which we choose to write. We want that world to make sense, for the parts to work together, and when it doesn't, it can be very frustrating.
For me I think I come down in the middle. I want to learn, to observe canon, but at the same time, I don't want canon to be the most important thing. Creativity has its place too and as catscatscats said, the spirit of collaboration is sometimes more important than getting every detail right.