Chapter Note

Chapter 31 Improving the Requirements Processes

© Karl E. Wiegers

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Objectives of Process Improvement (PI)

 Correcting problems encountered on previous or current projects

 Anticipating and preventing problems in the future projects

 Adopt practices that are more efficient

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1. How Requirements Relate to Other Project Processes - Recap

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1.1 How Requirements Relate to Other Project Processes explained - Recap

 Planning: foundation of the project planning  Tracking and Control: Monitoring the status

of each requirement  Change Control: After Base-lining all changes

are controlled  System Testing: System testing validates the

requirement  Construction: foundation for design and

implementation  User Documentation: provides input to the

user documentation

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2. Requirements and Various Stakeholder Group - Recap

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3. Fundamentals of Software Process Improvement (PI)

 PI should be evolutionary, continuous and cyclical : don’t expect to improve all processes at once

 Needs of Incentives to PI: missed deadline, overtime, waste of efforts, dissatisfaction, high maintenance, bad reputation

 Goal Oriented: Make a road map to defines a pathway

for specific goal (overtime, schedule, efforts etc)

 Treat as “mini” project: make PI itself to be a project that needs plans and resources

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4. Process Improvement Cycle

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4.1 Process Improvement Cycle Steps

 Assess current practices : using e.g., self- assessments, CMMI

 Plan Improvement actions: create action plan to target and tack specific area of improvement (Fig.31.6 shows a sample template)

 Create, Pilot and Implement new Processes: the action create pilot for implementing the action plan. It is an iterative process.

 Evaluate Results: evaluate whether newly implemented process is giving the desired result

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5. Requirement Engineering Process Assets

Types of Process Assets  Checklist : a list of activities, deliverables, or other items to be

noted and verified.

 Example: A representative of a work product.

 Plan: outline how an objective is to be accomplished and what is needed

 Policy: Guiding principle setting the management expectation

 Procedure: A step-by-step description of sequence of tasks to accomplish an activity

 Process : Definition of set of activities to be performed for some purpose.

 Template: A pattern for producing a complete work

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5.1 Development Process Assets

 Development Process: identify the all steps needed to develop the requirements (e.g., user- classes, elicitation technique, estimation etc)

 Allocation Procedure: placing the high-level requirement to specific design subsystems.

 Prioritization Procedure: need to plan specify the priority

 Vision and Scope template  Use-Case Template  SRS Template  SRS and Use-Case Defect checklist

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5.2 Management Process Assets

 Management Process: actions to deal with changes

 Change-Control Process: the way a new or modification can be proposed, communicated, evaluated and resolved

 Status Tracking Procedure: how the track the status of the requirements

 CCB Charter: composition, function, and operating procedure of the CCB

 Change Impact Analysis Checklist and Template  Traceability Procedure: e.g., use of traceability

matrix

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6 Requirement Management Improvement Road Map

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Represents the roadmap to improving the requirement process (see the following example)

Business Goals

Mile Stone 1

start

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