Gathering Requirements, Continued

In my previous post, The Art of Gathering Requirements, we looked at few tips on how to ensure that requirements are collected successfully. For today’s post, let’s look at the list that PMBOK Guide 4th Edition has outlined for the tools and techniques that can be used to collect the requirements. Let’s assume that Kat is the PM and she’s required to meet up with Customer OST to learn their needs for the newly proposed system.

• Interviews
  Interview sessions are normally done one-on-one. Kat will arrange a private that makes it easier for her to know the current situation the customer is in. Strength and weaknesses can be discussed openly. However, this technique can be highly time consuming; thus Kat needs to schedule the session properly and maybe pick a few important stakeholders for this technique.
• Focus Groups
  This technique is similar to interviews but it is done in group. Especially to a specific target group, for example the sales department, or the complains department, etc. Attendees are usually subject matter experts and qualified stakeholders. Kat will be the moderator for each focus group sessions. She could gather the necessary information interactively, however she must be able to maintain a positive climate during the discussion.
• Facilitated Workshops
  Kat can organised workshops between cross-functional stakeholders with she as the facilitator. With this technique, Kat can quickly see the inter-relationship between the departments. She would be able to see cross-functional requirements as well as the reconciling the different needs and expectations. Any issues can be discovered., prioritised and resolved quickly. Similar to focus groups technique, Katy as the facilitator must be able to maintain a positive climate to ensure trust can be fostered.
• Group Creativity Techniques
   
• Group Decision Making Techniques
  
• Questionnaires and Surveys
  This techniques are good for a wide number of respondent. Kat can collect huge amount of data in a brief period of time. With special demographic aspects, she would be able to derive statistical analysis quickly.
• Observations
  With this technique, Kat will sit down with the a user of the current system to see how the actual process is being performed. She can choose to perform “job shadowing” or be a “participant observer” where she is performing the tasks. This technique will be useful for Kat especially with people who are reluctant or have difficulty to articulate their requirements.
• Prototypes
  Kat will also quickly build a prototype with the information that she has currently to quickly get feedback from a working model. Some people can only see what they want when they look at what is being proposed. Several iterations of the prototype can be performed through progressive elaboration for the user to experiment and provide feedback. After the last cycle, the requirements collected would be enough to start building the actual product.

As she gather inputs and feedbacks from users, Kat will use several documents to refer to and to record all the requirements down:

• Requirements Documentation
  Within the organisation, this document is known as Requirements Specifications; where Kat will describe how each of the requirements will meet the business needs. As she collect more data, the document will be updated accordingly.
• Requirements Management Plan
  Kat would have prepared this document beforehand. Reason being, this document will tell her which techniques that she will be using to gather the requirements. She will also plan how the data will be analysed and documented.
• Requirements Traceability Matrix
  This document is essentially a table that links each requirements to its origin so that they can be traceable throughout the project life cycle.