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New Post 2/7/2013 1:16 PM
User is offline Tony Markos
493 posts
5th Level Poster


Re: what if there are no user requirements? 

qwerty:

You ask:  "Quite often the business requirement is the same as the user requirement?!"

I suggest that you ask yourself (and really few do this, so if you do, you will propel yourself ahead of the masses):  Is there a real need to partition behavioral related requirements seperately into business requirements, user requirements, and funcitonal requirements?   

Data flow diagramming principles tell us that the answer is no.  With DFD's we can, at the highest level of abstraction capture business behavioral-related goals.  And we can also decompose the business goals downwards to the detail level requirements met  by manual efforts or within a computer. 

In other words with DFD's ALL  behavioral requirements - whether the are manual or automated, high-level business or embedded within a computer - are called the exact same thing.   This unified view of requirements is critical to larger scale integration efforts, where a false partitioning of requirements into different types adds another layer of complexity that can really retard initiative.

Tony

 

 

 
New Post 2/8/2013 2:23 AM
User is offline qwertyjjj
19 posts
9th Level Poster


Re: what if there are no user requirements? 

 Tony Markos wrote
 

qwerty:

You ask:  "Quite often the business requirement is the same as the user requirement?!"

I suggest that you ask yourself (and really few do this, so if you do, you will propel yourself ahead of the masses):  Is there a real need to partition behavioral related requirements seperately into business requirements, user requirements, and funcitonal requirements?   

Data flow diagramming principles tell us that the answer is no.  With DFD's we can, at the highest level of abstraction capture business behavioral-related goals.  And we can also decompose the business goals downwards to the detail level requirements met  by manual efforts or within a computer. 

In other words with DFD's ALL  behavioral requirements - whether the are manual or automated, high-level business or embedded within a computer - are called the exact same thing.   This unified view of requirements is critical to larger scale integration efforts, where a false partitioning of requirements into different types adds another layer of complexity that can really retard initiative.

Tony

 

 

 

You could just as easily model some of it in a Use Case as well though?

I suppose it depends on the project or system but perhaps the User requirement can be used during UAT by the actual users to see what they have to check and what was supposed to be included.

The BR might be: design an online shop

The URs might be: buy, edit account, checkout, login, logout + use cases

The FRs might be: the exact data processing, field names, how often updates occur, etc.

 

But sometimes you get a BR for a system enhancement, which is just: we now need to include all email addresses as usernames. The user requirement is almost the same here, it would be UR: user can use an email address or a username to login.

 
New Post 2/8/2013 2:21 PM
User is offline Chris Adams
323 posts
5th Level Poster






Re: what if there are no user requirements? 
Modified By Chris Adams  on 2/8/2013 5:22:22 PM)

 Qwertyjjj,


I'll try to answer this based on the framework I believe you are trying to use.

The BABOK classifies requirements into 4 groups.
Business Requirements
Stakeholder Requirements
Solution Requirements (which can further be split into Functional Requirements and Non-Functional Requirements)
Transition Requirements

This is similar to your BR, UR, FR model where the Stakeholder Requirements are your URs.  I wrote on interview question and answer on this topic here. 

Stakeholder requirements get tricky for some people to understand because it depends on the particular stakeholder or user group.  You could have a single Business Requirement which in order to properly implement or achieve means different things to different user groups.  That's because different user groups across different business units or divisions of the organization have different responsibilities. Sometimes in fact, two different user groups could have seemingly contradictory requirements to meet their portion of the business requirement.  This is where Stakeholder/User requirements become most important.

If this is not the case, and all user groups would support the business requirement in the same way, then the user requirement is typically the SAME as the business requirement.

So in the example you give, you're right.  The BR and the UR can be nearly identical.  However, your BR should give more information as to why it needs an email.  You need to provide a rationale, or the WHY behind the requirement.

Chris Adams
Core Member – ModernAnalyst.com
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