Some rules for successful requirements gathering
We know that IT system development is not only about the offer of automation services based on the requirements of the customer or consumers, but it’s about development business strategy, about business development. For example, you have a shop, and when you created a web-site you have received a new market. If you are working in an international company which work with delivery shipments and you have created new technology about exchanges of shipment dates for your client, a big international company, you get a new market too, your business had gone to the next level because of the new technology. The new technology may give you possibility for work faster, with high quality and with new clients. And all of these examples about development both strategies: IT Strategy and Business strategy. So, we need successful business analysis, including requirements gathering for this process as one of the main it part. In the Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide by PMI [1] the term Business Analysis is defined as “the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to:
All of you know how many projects have fails, and these failures being attributed to requirements gathering, it’s almost 70% of all project failures [2]. How could we realize the right Business Analysis (or discovered requirements) and get the set of the right requirements? It’s very important to see in the right direction (Figure). For determine problems and identify business needs we have to see around us, to find obvious things, and we have to use some set of rules. Figure – Discover requirements For my opinion, there are three most important set of rules. The first set is about right questions when you try to discover problems and formulate requirements [1]. It is like a 5W1H (Five Ws and One How) method. Answers on these questions are considered basic in information gathering. Therefore, in the business analysis we have also five Why. Here are some typical questions with why:
In addition, of course, you have to remember to choose the right person as an interviewee. The second set is about requirements management [3]:
And the third set is about result analysis [4]:
In conclusion, to formulate the right requirements is a very complexity task, and there are a lot of information about different methods and tools. Above rules could be fundament in your requirements gathering. References:
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It's a magic time...
Recently I was actually in a situation very tight deadline and a too brief time. Except my mains projects I was attracted to work as an analyst for a large Federal project. And I had had to develop subsystem decomposition, description of the components and modules, and clarification of details and preparation of the final document in the two days. I knew I must calculate my power for doing all work in time and with a high quality, and also I knew I must don’t work at night, and leave a little time to rest. I was decided to count the time and monitor them during work. I must have had to create eighteen schemes and their descriptions. I created one and write the begin time and the end time. Then I made the same with another, because they could have had the different complexity. I must have had to create eighteen schemes and their descriptions. Then I made the same with another, because they could have had the different complexity. After that I knew average time. And I developed my plan, I calculated time worked on each scheme and on its description accordingly with the complexity of the schemes. The remaining time was planned under the necessary things, including eating, taking some rest, and sleep. At the end of the second day I was finished the whole job. The secret is, as I think, that in these two days I had not spent unnoticed, perhaps, not one minute, not what hours. Of course, such strict regulations are not always needed, but it allows you to gather, concentrate and to complete the job. Measurement time is necessary for management yourself, for work management. And there are different ways to use it for the different types of work. The time is magic, if you want to do something you will do it. |