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Best Practices for
Software Projects - Requirements Scrubbing
A key component
to delivering software projects on-time and on-budget is to do
a great job of defining the requirements of the system and to
be objective as to which requirements are absolutely
necessary. Once the requirements are defined, they
should be reviewed with a fine-tooth comb to ensure that all
the requirement details are fully defined and that each
requirement is absolutely necessary for the release of the
software.
The process of
reviewing each requirement in detail is called Requirements
Scrubbing. Each requirement should be evaluated
objectively by the JAD Session members and a decision should
be made as to whether the requirement is absolutely
necessary for the upcoming release. Any requirements
that can be eliminated from the upcoming release will have a
direct savings on time and money, as it eliminates the need to
go through design, programming, testing and
documentation. All requirements that are not absolutely
necessary for the upcoming release can be marked for a future
release.
Each requirement
should be evaluated for the following criteria:
- Is the
requirement absolutely necessary for the upcoming
release? If not, it should be moved to a future
release.
- Is the
requirement sufficiently defined so that the designers will
easily be able to provide a design for the
requirement?
- Is the
requirement in it's simplest form? Many times
requirements are not well thought out and can be more
complex than is needed. This causes unneeded time and
effort in the programming and testing phases.
- Can you
substitute other options for a requirement? For example,
let's say that you have a requirement that calls for a spell
checker to be implemented for your user interface.
However, another team in your company has already created a
web service that does the same thing and it has been fully
tested. This is a good example as to where you can use
another option that yields the same result but with faster
and improved execution.
Requirement Scrubbing can dramatically
increase your chances of delivering on-time and
on-budget. Below are some helpful templates to aid you
in developing software solutions on-time and
on-budget:
About the
Author
Steve Miller is the
President of Pragmatic Software (http://www.PragmaticSW.com). With over 20 years of experience, Steve has
extensive knowledge in project management, software
architecture and test design. Steve publishes a monthly
newsletter for companies that design and develop
software. You can read other newsletters at http://www.PragmaticSW.com/Newsletters.htm. Steve's email is steve.miller@PragmaticSW.com.
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