Tips for Discovering Requirements

Submitted by BobCunha on Tue, 2008-02-12 11:59.

By Bob Cunha

In the world of software development, it is well known that “good” requirements are needed to deliver a quality product and achieve customer satisfaction. The most common reason for software project failure is attributed to requirements issues – badly defined, not stated correctly, changing requirements, etc.

Requirements are not simply out there waiting to be collected. Instead, it is an investigation process whereby requirements need to be discovered, examined, and molded. The discovery process is more of an art than a science, and certainly experience with this process is a big factor in knowing how to best discover requirements. This article offers seven tips on requirements investigation to help discover and define “good” requirements.

Bob Cunha is an independent consultant specializing in business systems analysis and project management

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Solid and helpfull

Submitted by MichaelSteen on Wed, 2008-02-13 01:56. *

Hi Bob,

Loved reading your article! It's solid an helpfull, touches key-points and has a great simularity with Interaction Design principles for getting (user) requirements.

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Good read

Submitted by Tharikh on Thu, 2008-02-14 00:11. *

This article is excellent and the tips are a good reminder to all on getting key requirements.

Tharikh Babu S
Associate Business Consultant

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Great article for both beginn

Submitted by BA1 on Fri, 2008-02-15 10:27. *

Great article for both beginners and the experienced.

Emal B
Business Analyst
IIBA Member

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Good article.

Submitted by Ruslan on Tue, 2008-02-26 11:16. *

That is real how it is.

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Great advice

Submitted by aperris on Mon, 2008-03-10 14:16. *

I really enjoyed your article, Bob. You offer great advice for eliciting 'excellent" requirements.

I especially appreciated the recommendation that people first need to define the terms used for requirements. It can be very painful when different team members are not in sync with what is going to be elicited, how it will be presented, and to what level of detail.

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