The Art of Gathering Requirements

Most of the time, customers react "violently" towards services or products that is delivered. They seem to be surprised with the outcome, even though they have approved and signed off the requirements specifications earlier on in the project. They will say that they have not requested such and such and what they want is this and that.

Why is this so? Remember this comic:

One important thing to remember is that a service or product to be delivered is based on the needs and wants of the customer; the requirements. Therefore it is imperative that requirements are collected correctly from the right sources. And however we; as the PM; want it, the product is not our brainchild, the project is! So deliver the correct product, the project is a success!

I see requirements gathering process as an art of its own. Reason being, it is not as easy as A-B-C. You need to spend time for it and refine it as detailed as possible. A work of art is not rushed. It is planned carefully; and sometimes changed as the artist deems fit.

Let's look at the strokes that must be done for an excellent finish of an artwork; the requirements specifications.

1. Identify the correct people – Ensure that the people that the requirements are gathered from, are truly the recipients of the service or the users of the product. This people will know the nitty-gritty.
2. Organise a Requirements Gathering Session – If need be, organise a two-day seminar instead of four hours requirements gathering meeting. Arrange different sessions for different group of people, for different types of requirements; functional, non-functional.
3. Ask the users what they want – Utilising techniques like interviews, focus groups, brainstorming, etc. let the users tell you what they want. Most of the time they want everything because they think the need everything. Let them. This is the session where we listen to them. Ask questions to clarify points that are vague, but do not attempt to improve their ideas; this might in the end misled them.
4. Review what the users want – Utilise story-telling techniques, storyboard, flowcharts, tables, diagram, prototypes, etc when reviewing the points collected from the previous session in #3. If possible, organise this review session as soon as possible after the previous session. This is to ensure users are still fresh with their ideas from before. The objective is to understand the points made in #3.
5. Improve the ideas – Separate the needs from the wants. Get the users to prioritise their requirements. Suggest improvements to the ideas to increase the value of the product or service.
6. Agree on delivery phases – If possible, group the requirements and create delivery phases (exclude timeline). Get the users to agree to them. While work is on going, schedule review sessions in each phase to ensure the work done is meeting the requirements. If there is any changes from the users, assess and include accordingly. Remember; while cooking a meal, we check for taste from time to time, to ensure it is as expected. Similarly, perform continuous review on work done to avoid bottle necks of change requests later.
7. Prepare the requirements specification document – James C. Taylor in his book Project Scheduling and Cost Control, listed 8 Tips For Writing Good SOW. Once the document is prepared, review it with the customer, point by point.
8. Get endorsement – Get the customer to sign-off the requirements specification document to show they have understood and agreed to it.
9. Be true to your promises – Some change requests will be shelved for a later phase, or next release. If you have promised this to the customer, make sure you deliver them as agreed. You might want to review again the change requests to see if it is still relevant to the users, but review them you must!
10. Update project documents accordingly – Do not wait until last minute to update the related project documents. If you already have project templates, make use of them; no need to create from scratch.

With this 10 strokes, hopefully the customers will not be surprised the next time they see the completed product for the first time.