Conventional Requirements Model Flaw Misses REAL Business Requirements
by Robin F. Goldsmith, JD
A fundamental flaw in the widely-held conventional model of requirements creates much of creep and other requirements difficulties. This flaw involves misunderstanding of the nature and role of REAL business requirements. The term “REAL” relates to requirements in two ways. The first way is widely recognizable and is represented in lower-case. People think they know what the requirements are and then learn differently and must revise their requirements definition. Thus, the “real” requirements are what one ends up with, as opposed to what one may have thought initially.
The second use of “REAL” warrants distinguishing with upper case because it represents breakthrough awareness that REAL requirements are business requirements, which are in business terms and are what must be delivered to provide value.
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| Conventional Requirements Model Flaw Misses REAL Business Requirements.pdf | 158.75 KB |
"What problem are you solving?"
That's my favourite question for business clients.
Over the years I've found its difficult for business clients to articulate their requirements in "REAL" terms. They tend to want to jump to the solution by describing what they want in concrete terms. I'll speculate that there are two reasons for this. First, its the corporate culture. The seat of your pants, gut feel, testosterone driven management style does not tend to reward careful needs analysis. Second, and more commonly, it requires some level of abstract thinking to get at the core problem statement from a plethora of symptoms the business is experiencing. And they find that hard and that's because it is hard. In either case its just easier for them to describe the problem in terms of a solution. The BA's initial task is to help and coach them in developing their problem statement from all their, er, great ideas. Your part analyst part therapist. Be gentle.