Mastering the Requirements Process

Description

Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgments
About the Authors

Part I: Requirements Are the Root of Everything
Chapter 1: Requirements Fundamentals
Chapter 2: Your Requirements Arena

Part II: Project Blastoff
Chapter 3: Understand the Real Problem
Chapter 4: The Value of Solving the Problem
Chapter 5: Goals-Scope-Stakeholders
Chapter 6: Customer Segments
Chapter 7: Business Events
Chapter 8: Prioritizing the Business Events
Chapter 9: To Go or Not to Go?

Part III: Prototyping for Requirements
Chapter 10: Generating Sacrificial Candidate Solutions
Chapter 11: Prototypes, Prototypes, Prototypes
Chapter 12: Ready-Made Solutions
Chapter 13: Creative Candidate Solutions
Chapter 14: Probing and Exploring the Candidates
Chapter 15: Using Prototypes as the Specification

Part IV: Trawling for Requirements
Chapter 16: The Essence of the Problem
Chapter 17: Business Events and Business Use Cases
Chapter 18: The Brown Cow Model
Chapter 19: Workshops
Chapter 20: Scenarios
Chapter 21: Stories
Chapter 22: Business Process Models
Chapter 23: Stored Data
Chapter 24: Other Trawling Techniques

Part V: Writing Good Requirements and Stories
Chapter 25: Functional Requirements
Chapter 26: Non-functional Requirements
Chapter 27: Fit Criteria and Rationale
Chapter 28: Writing Good Stories
Chapter 29: Acceptance Criteria

Part VI: Designing Business Solutions
Chapter 30: Business Solutions
Chapter 31: Determine the Extent of the Automation
Chapter 32: Designing Information and Functionality
Chapter 33: Designing Using Ready-Mades

Part VII: Requirements Repository
Chapter 34: Requirements Specification
Chapter 35: Story Map
Chapter 36: Quality Thinking
Chapter 37: Completeness Check
Chapter 38: Managing Requirements

Part VIII: The Conduct of Business Analysis
Chapter 39: Your Process
Chapter 40: The Importance of the Early Days
Chapter 41: People
Chapter 42: Systems Thinking
Chapter 43: Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Chapter 44: Learning as You Go
Chapter 45: Requirements and Innovation

Appendix A: The Volere Requirements Specification Template
Appendix B: Stakeholder Management Templates
Appendix C: Volere Requirements Knowledge Model

Glossary
Bibliography
Index

One of the joys of product development, whether it be software, service, or hardware, is getting it right. The way to get it right is to uncover the real business problem, and to write the requirements for the solution that best solves that problem.

Without the right requirements it is impossible to build the right solution. Mastering the Requirements Process, Fourth Edition, gives you an industry-proven process for getting to the essence of the business problem and then writing unambiguous and testable requirements for its solution.

This fourth edition is an almost complete rewrite that brings requirements discovery into today’s world–it is the book for today’s business analyst. Product owners and project leaders will also find it valuable as it explains how to discover precisely what the customer needs and wants, and to do it effectively in any business or project environment.

The book tells you how to:

• Use the Volere requirements process to discover requirements in both traditional and agile environments
• Incorporate off-the-shelf (OTS) solutions into your requirements discovery
• Use artificial intelligence (AI) as part of your requirements discovery, and as part of your business solution
• Use quickly sketched prototypes to explore the problem space
• Understand functional and non-functional requirements
• Write better agile stories
• Make your requirements and stories measurable and testable using fit criteria
• Use business events as the heartbeat of business analysis
• Discover requirements in agile, commercial, and milspec project environments
• Find and prioritize your customer segments
• Leverage systems thinking when discovering requirements
• Use story maps and other requirements repository techniques
• Know which trawling techniques are the most effective for requirements discovery
• Synchronize your requirements discovery with agile development teams
• Make better decisions in the early days of a project to increase your chances of success
• Employ the Volere requirements specification template (downloaded 10,000+ times) as the basis for your own requirement specifications

“One of the most valuable things about this book is that it provides a process to follow that will get people asking the right questions and expand their perspective on the problem.”
–Kevin Brennan

James Robertson and Suzanne Robertson are two of the most respected names in business analysis and requirements discovery. During the Robertsons’ careers, their books, templates, training, and consulting have helped hundreds of companies to upgrade their requirements discovery process. The Robertsons have written numerous books, among others the three previous editions of this book, Business Analysis Agility, and with their co-authors at the Atlantic Systems Guild, the acclaimed Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies. James and Suzanne live in London and France.

Additional information