7.4.2 What's fundamentally wrong? Improving our approach towards capturing value in requirements specification
Tom Gilb, Lindsey Brodie · INCOSE International Symposium · 2012
Abstract We are all aware that many of our IT projects fail and disappoint: the poor state of requirements practice is frequently stated as a contributing factor. This article proposes a fundamental cause is that we think like programmers, not engineers and managers. We fail to concentrate on value delivery, and instead focus on functions, on use‐cases and on code delivery. Our requirements specification practices fail to adequately address capturing value‐related information. Compounding this problem, senior management is not taking its responsibility to make things better: managers are not effectively communicating about value and demanding value delivery. This article outlines some practical suggestions aimed at tackling these problems and improving the quality of requirements specification.