Just Enough Requirements Management: Where Software Development Meets Marketing(Dorset House eBooks)

This is the digital version of the printed book (Copyright © 2005). If you develop software without understanding the requirements, you're wasting your time. On the other hand, if a project spends too much time trying to understand the requirements, it will end up late and/or over-budget. And products that are created by such projects can be just as unsuccessful as those that fail to meet the basic requirements. Instead, every company must make a reasonable trade-off between what's required and what time and resources are available. Finding the right balance for your project may depend on many factors, including the corporate culture, the time-to-market pressure, and the criticality of the application. That is why requirements management—gathering requirements, identifying the "right" ones to satisfy, and documenting them—is essential. Just Enough Requirements Management shows you how to discover, prune, and document requirements when you are subjected to tight schedule constraints. You'll apply just enough process to minimize risks while still achieving desired outcomes. You'll determine how many requirements are just enough to satisfy your customers while still meeting your goals for schedule, budget, and resources. If your project has insufficient resources to satisfy all the requirements of your customers, you must read Just Enough Requirements Management.  

Table of Contents:
&> Preface Chapter One: Introduction 3 Requirements 3 Requirements Management 6 Just Enough 8 The Context of Requirements 10 The Relationship Between Schedule and Requirements 18 The Components of Requirements Management 23 The Importance of Requirements Management 36 Chapter Two: Requirements Elicitation 40 Definitions and Terminology 40 Why Do Elicitation? 45 Elicitation Techniques 45 The Result of Elicitation 59 The Secrets of Just Enough Elicitation 61 Chapter Three: Requirements Triage 63 Definitions and Terminology 63 Why Do Triage? 67 Basic Triage Techniques 68 Advanced Triage Techniques 97 The Result of Triage 115 The Secrets of Just Enough Triage 116 Chapter Four: Requirements Specification 119 Definitions and Terminology 119 Classic Requirements Documentation Styles 122 The Content of a Requirements Document 125 The Role of a Requirements Document 127 Qualities of a Requirements Document 128 Specification Techniques 136 The Result of Specification 156 The Secrets of Just Enough Specification 161 Chapter Five: Requirements Change 163 Where Do Changes Come From? 164 How to Keep Track of Requested Changes 165 Choices for Handling the Changes 165 The CCB Meeting 170 The Secrets of Just Enough Change 171   Chapter Six: Summary 172 Requirements Elicitation 173 Requirements Triage 174 Requirements Specification 175 Requirements Change Management 176 Appendix A: Quick Recipes 177 Brainstorm 178 Decide What Is or Isn't a Requirement 183 Decide What to Build 185 Produce a Requirements Document 188 Assess the Quality of a Requirements Document 190 Baseline the Requirements 192 Ensure That Everybody Knows the Requirements 192 Handle New Requirements After Baselining 194 Handle Multiple Customers 196 Appendix B: A Set of Documented Requirements 200 References and Additional Readings 209 Index 227 About the Author 239  

About the Author :
ALAN M. DAVIS is Professor of Business Strategy and Entrepreneurship at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs and president of Offtoa, Inc. He was a member of the board of directors of Requisite, Inc., acquired by Rational Software Corporation in February, 1997, and subsequently acquired by IBM in 2003. He has consulted for many corporations during the past 27 years, including Boeing, Cigna Insurance, Federal Express, General Electric, IBM, Mitsubishi Electric, and many more. Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Software from 1994 to 1998, he has published numerous books and more than 100 articles in journals, conference proceedings, and trade press, and has lectured 2,000-plus times in 28 countries.