Requirement elicitation approach

Question: How do you start the requirement elicitation and analysis work? Or what would be your approach for collecting requirements?

Response: 

The elicitation and analysis begins the moment the Request for Proposal (RFP) or any other client requirement document is received or understanding from prior discussions.

We study the document and research the topic and make a requirement elicitation plan which includes:

•   What techniques to use to collect requirements? For ex. focus groups, interviews,     Joint Application Development (JAD) sessions, shadowing, questionnaire, etc.
•   How to record the information you collect?
•   Time frame/schedule for information collection?
•   Initial design/architecture on base system.

In parallel we dissect the requirement and try to develop a Work Break Down structure in which we define the smallest unit of deliverable we need to produce. For ex. Let’s consider a sport’s club system in that has epics and user stores. For instance, member accessing my account can be an epic, whereas member login, or reset password can be user stories.

In this process we collect questions we need answers for clarifications.

Initial requirement artifacts are developed which are used during JAD sessions with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) and clients. We try to nail down the requirements as much as we can.

We document the requirements in Business Requirement Documents (BRDs) and Functional Specs which include use cases, flow/activity diagram, data requirement, configuration needs, business rules, assumptions, exclusions. The document templates vary with company.

Documents goes for internal approval, walk through sessions are organized consisting of internal stakeholders. Once changes are incorporated, and internally accepted, it’s forwarded to client for acceptance and sign off.