The purpose of the Requirements Management Plan is to lay out the processes and procedures that will be used to collect, analyze, and manage the project requirements. This plan specifies the approach and the tools that will be used to manage all functional and technical requirements throughout the project life cycle.
The term “requirement” is defined to be a condition, task, or something tangible that is needed or wanted. Requirements are expected to be produced by the project as deliverables.
Not all requirements are known at project initiation. Some requirements are uncovered during progressive elaboration that may continue throughout the project lifecycle. An example might include a custom software development project where some desired features or functions may not be identified until after coding has completed and testing is underway.
So, what should be in the Requirements Management Plan?
Requirements Collection
Begin with a description of how the project requirements will be collected. There are a variety of techniques available for collection. See our post on Project Requirement Collection and Clarification Techniques
Requirements Tracking
Provide a tracking methodology such a Requirements Log. All requirements should be logged into this register and should be analyzed, categorized, prioritized, and quantified. All requirements that survive analysis will be added to the Requirements Traceability Matrix and traced through until project completion. See out post on Requirements Traceability.
Requirements Analysis
Describe how the requirements will be analyzed to remove duplicates and resolve conflicts. Are the requirements too narrow? Too broad? Describe how the requirements will be analyzed and who will do the analysis. Describe who will ensure each requirement is written clearly and completely. Describe who is responsible to maintain the Requirements Log and the Requirements Traceability Matrix.
Requirement Categories
Here are some common requirement categories. Your organization by have other categories.
- Business requirements
- Functional requirements
- Technical requirements
- Legal requirement
- Organizational requirements
Prioritization
Describe how the requirements will be prioritized. Will a numbering system be utilized to indicate priority? Will some categories have higher priority than others? Who makes the prioritization decisions? What happens to the requirements with the highest priority? What happens to the requirements with the lowest priority?
Quantification
Every requirement must be actionable, measurable, and testable. Requirement decomposition ensures to determine whether the requirement is complete or not. The end result of quantification is that the requirements are mutually agreed between the project team and the customer, and acceptance criteria is established.
Requirements Metrics
There many ways requirements can be measured, here are a few. Be sure to include acceptable variances.
- Cost
- Quality
- Performance
Requirement Rejections
Requirements are sometimes rejected by the customer and/or project team. Define the rejection procedures and who has the final authority to request a requirement.
Requirement Approval
Each requirement should be approved by the customer, the project team, and project sponsors.
Requirements Traceability Matrix
This register is arguably the one of the most important project documents and manages the complete requirements lifecycle. This matrix is usually created in a spreadsheet with the requirements listed in rows. Here are the common columns:
- ID number
- Requirement name
- Requirement description
- Origin – usually, an item number in an RFP list of requirements, or perhaps verbally from a stakeholder
- Integration Test procedure
- Qualification Test procedure
- Factory Test procedure
- Site Acceptance Test procedure
- Comments
Requirements Validation
Testing validates the project requirements have been met. Testing ensures each requirement meets the agreed acceptance criteria. Requirements Validation outlines the testing procedures that will be detailed in the appropriate test plans: Integration Test Plan, Qualification Test Plan, Factory Test Plan, and the Site Acceptance Test Plan.
Requirements Reporting
This section outlines when requirements reports will be generated and to whom they are sent.
Requirements Management Plan Approvals
This section describes the process for approving requirements before they are added to the traceability index and who has the final authority to approve the project requirements.