Requirements are a crucial ingredient of any successful project. This is true for any product--software, hardware, consumer appliance, or large-scale construction. You have to understand its requirements--what is needed and desired--if you are to build the right product. Most developers recognize the truth in this statement, even if they don't always live up to it. Far less obvious, however, is the contribution that the requirements activity makes to project management. Requirements, along with other outputs from the requirements activity, are potent project management tools. In "Requirements-Led Project Management, " Suzanne and James Robertson show how to use requirements to manage the development lifecycle. They show program managers, product and project managers, team leaders, and business analysts specifically how to: Use requirements as input to project planning and decision-makingDetermine whether to invest in a projectDeliver more appropriate products with a quick cycle timeMeasure and estimate the requirements effortDefine the most effective requirements process for a projectManage stakeholder involvement and expectationsSet requirements prioritiesManage requirements across multiple domains and technologiesUse requirements to communicate across business and technological boundaries In their previous book, "Mastering the Requirements Process, " the Robertsons defined Volere--their groundbreaking and now widely adopted requirements process. In this second book, they look at the outputs from the requirements process and demonstrate how you can take advantage of the all-important links between requirements and project success.

This book provides a stakeholder-centered analysis of projects and explains which identification, analysis, communication, and engagement models are relevant to different types of projects. If stakeholders matter, then they must make a difference in the way we plan structure and execute projects. Do they matter on your projects? This book provides a stakeholder-centered analysis of projects and explains which identification, analysis, communication, and engagement models are relevant to different types of projects: from an office move to IT enterprise change to transformational business change and complex social change. Using case studies from around the world, it illustrates what goes wrong when stakeholders are not engaged successfully and what lessons we can learn from these examples. In this second edition, we also look at the impact of Agile practices on the stakeholder management process. What changes in approach can we anticipate, and what practices must continue regardless of the product development life cycle adopted? Key models introduced include: Role-based and agenda-based stakeholders; The stakeholder-neutral to stakeholder-led project continuum; The extended stakeholder management process; Purposeful communication—the six whys model for communication; The principles of stakeholder engagement; Stakeholder engagement in an agile world.

Organizations continue to experience project issues associated with poor performance on requirements-related activities. This guide will give you the tools you need to excel in requirements development and management — components of the larger field of business analysis and a critical competence for project, program and portfolio management. Requirements Management: A Practice Guide is a bridge between A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK&® Guide), which speaks to requirements development and management from a high-level perspective, and Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide, which describes requirements development and management at a detailed and practical level. This practice guide is the middle ground, offering project managers, program managers, teams members and stakeholders the opportunity to learn more about the requirements process

“If the purpose is to create one of the best books on requirements yet written, the authors have succeeded.” —Capers Jones Software can solve almost any problem. The trick is knowing what the problem is. With about half of all software errors originating in the requirements activity, it is clear that a better understanding of the problem is needed. Getting the requirements right is crucial if we are to build systems that best meet our needs. We know, beyond doubt, that the right requirements produce an end result that is as innovative and beneficial as it can be, and that system development is both effective and efficient. Mastering the Requirements Process: Getting Requirements Right, Third Edition, sets out an industry-proven process for gathering and verifying requirements, regardless of whether you work in a traditional or agile development environment. In this sweeping update of the bestselling guide, the authors show how to discover precisely what the customer wants and needs, in the most efficient manner possible. Features include The Volere requirements process for discovering requirements, for use with both traditional and iterative environments A specification template that can be used as the basis for your own requirements specifications Formality guides that help you funnel your efforts into only the requirements work needed for your particular development environment and project How to make requirements testable using fit criteria Checklists to help identify stakeholders, users, non-functional requirements, and more Methods for reusing requirements and requirements patterns New features include Strategy guides for different environments, including outsourcing Strategies for gathering and implementing requirements for iterative releases “Thinking above the line” to find the real problem How to move from requirements to finding the right solution The Brown Cow model for clearer viewpoints of the system Using story cards as requirements Using the Volere Knowledge Model to help record and communicate requirements Fundamental truths about requirements and system development

Most project managers would agree that every project is unique. But not all project managers would agree that the best way to manage a unique project is unique. Many still cling to the old practice of having a methodology that is applied to all projects. "One size fits all" is still in common use, and this approach has proven to lead to project failure. Flexibility, situational intelligence, and creativity are essential to deliver project success. The need to recognize and master ever-changing requirements and environmental conditions is a tough challenge for professional project managers. The same practices that led to success yesterday may cause failure today. Selecting favorable responses to a given situation is often the most critical factor of the dynamics of success and failure. This book is designed to help project professionals assess a situation, predict the appropriate approach, methodology and achieving styles, and then apply them in a situational fashion. To guide project managers in selecting the appropriate responses, Situational Project Management (SitPM) shows how to assess a given project, determine its unique characteristics, and select the appropriate methods to complete the project. With this book, projects managers can use SitPM to develop profiles of their projects on the basis of the projects’ physical characteristics, the project teams’ behavioral characteristics, the enterprise environment, and the market environments receiving project deliverables. These profiles help project managers to determine the appropriate project life cycle approach and leadership style. The book also explores various ways to engage stakeholders on the basis of a project’s SitPM profile. The book’s author, Oliver F. Lehmann, has developed a set of templates to apply SitPM in practice. It can be downloaded from www.oliverlehmann.com/SitPM/Templates.zip.

Incomplete or missed requirements, omissions, ambiguous product features, lack of user involvement, unrealistic customer expectations, and the proverbial scope creep can result in cost overruns, missed deadlines, poor product quality, and can very well ruin a project. This book explains how to elicit, document, and manage requirements to control project scope creep. It also describes how to manage project stakeholders to minimize the risk of an ever-growing list of user requirements. The book examines five different projects and traces their development from a project scope management perspective.

Project Requirements: A Guide to Best Practices gives project managers tools they can assimilate and apply easily to improve project success rates, reduce development costs, reduce rework, and accelerate time to market. Based on experience and best practices, this valuable reference will help you: • Clarify real requirements before you initiate project work • Improve management of project requirements • Save time and effort • Manage to your schedule • Improve the quality of deliverables • Increase customer satisfaction and drive repeat business Project Requirements: A Guide to Best Practices provides project managers with a direct, practical strategy to overcome requirements challenges and manage requirements successfully.