Project Requirements
Project Requirements are conditions or tasks that must be completed to ensure the success or completion of the project.
They provide a clear picture of the work that needs to be done.
They’re meant to align the project’s resources with the objectives of the organisation.
What are the benefits
The benefits of effectively gathering Project Requirements include
- Cost reduction,
- Higher project success rates,
- More effective change management,
- Improved communication among stakeholders.
Categories
Project Requirements can be categorized into three main categories: business, solution, and stakeholder requirements.
Business Requirements are the high-level needs of the business. They address what’s required and why the project is happening. This is the starting point of the project and provides guidance for the other types of requirements. It’s imperative that these requirements are communicated clearly and early on.
Solution Requirements, which include both functional and non-functional requirements, are the specific features and characteristics of the product or service that meet all requirements, both business and stakeholder. Functional requirements describe something that a product or service is required to do. Non-functional requirements describe how a system is supposed to function. A functional requirement for your solar panel is to ‘convert light into electricity,’ while the non-functional requirement is to ‘produce this electricity at an efficiency rate of 20%.’.
Stakeholder Requirements, a stakeholder is anyone who has an interest in the product or service that’s being produced or provided. They may be internal stakeholders (employees) or external stakeholders (customers, regulators, or suppliers). Every individual stakeholder has specific needs or requirements that they want to be fulfilled.
Each of these needs must be balanced during the course of the project. Often times, stakeholders have competing needs, which can impact the schedule, budget, and scope of the project if not managed effectively. Changes will have a knock-on effect in terms of pricing, materials and design and will ultimately slow down the project.
When a stakeholder happens to be your customer, you need to ensure that you’re eliciting their exact requirements in order to deliver on your product or service. If the right questions are not asked using the right method, you will not meet customer needs and, in the end, the project will have failed.