Getting Software Requirements Right

When a company is struggling because their software products get stuck in testing and redesign, and are slow to shoot out the end of the development cycle, the problem is most likely poor requirements. Getting product requirements right early in the development process is critical to creating software products efficiently.

Bad Requirements Make Bad Products

I once worked for a large telecommunications company, as a member of a team that was developing a web-based software product used to manage large communication networks. As this company went through cost reductions and downsizing, there were major cuts in the department that wrote the requirements. Over time, the requirements became less thorough and more likely to contain errors. As the quality of the requirements degraded, there was increased confusion in the development and testing departments. It became harder and harder to get software releases out on time and on budget. It was a case study in how to poorly develop software products.

The Benefits of Getting It Right

Anyone who has studied the design process knows that the cost of changes increases exponentially as changes occur later and later in the product development process. A thorough process for discovering and documenting requirements enables problems to be found and fixed early in the development process. This speeds up product development, saves development cost, and increases product quality.

How a Company Can Fix Its Requirements

Finding a company that can help you to properly document your business requirements is key. Here at DefinedLogic, we pride ourselves on generating the most detailed functional specifications. We are specialists in business analysis and requirements writing. We deploy teams that get to work immediately, and integrate seamlessly with teams already in place. We solution and document requirements for Fortune 100 companies and for start-up companies. Our expertise crosses many industries such as communications, healthcare, insurance, education, government, and more. We focus on the user experience, and help uncover creative solutions that make software products easy to use.

Any time I’m using a web site owned by a large company and it doesn’t work as I’d expect, I can’t help but think that someone didn’t get the requirements right, and that DefinedLogic could have made a difference.

Have you encountered a web site or software product that you think didn’t get the requirements right?