What are the best practices for ensuring functional requirements are realistic?

1 Define the scope

The first step to ensure realistic functional requirements is to define the scope of the system, that is, the boundaries, objectives, and deliverables of the project. The scope should be clear, specific, and agreed upon by all the stakeholders, including the users, developers, managers, and sponsors. The scope should also be documented and communicated to avoid scope creep, which is the tendency to add more features or functions that are not part of the original plan.

2 Use standard techniques

The second step to ensure realistic functional requirements is to use standard techniques for eliciting, analyzing, specifying, and validating them. Some of the common techniques are interviews, surveys, workshops, observation, prototyping, use cases, user stories, and scenarios. These techniques help to capture the user needs, expectations, and preferences, as well as the business rules, constraints, and assumptions. They also help to avoid ambiguity, inconsistency, and incompleteness in the functional requirements.

5 Test and verify

The fifth step to ensure realistic functional requirements is to test and verify them before, during, and after the system development. Testing and verifying help to ensure that the system meets the functional requirements, and that the functional requirements meet the user needs and expectations. Testing and verifying also help to detect and correct any errors, defects, or deviations in the system functionality. Some of the common methods for testing and verifying functional requirements are unit testing, integration testing, system testing, acceptance testing, and traceability matrix.

6 Use tools and templates

The sixth step to ensure realistic functional requirements is to use tools and templates that facilitate and standardize the functional requirements specification process. Tools and templates help to organize, document, communicate, and manage the functional requirements, and to ensure their consistency, quality, and traceability. Tools and templates also help to reduce the effort, time, and cost of the functional requirements specification process. Some of the common tools and templates are requirement management software, requirement specification templates, and requirement modeling tools.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?