1. Using Innovation Management
  2. Requirement Attributes that are Collected in Requirements Specifications

Requirement Attributes that are Collected in Requirements Specifications

On a requirement, there are four attributes that are used by product managers to assess progress or completion status: Priority, In Scope, Estimates, and Fulfilled.

The values for these attributes are tabulated and summarized at the requirements specification level of the structure.

A requirements specification displays two pie charts on the Analysis side tab:

  1. Fulfillment Status depicts percentages of requirements in the structure that the In Scope attribute is set to Yes and that the Fulfilled attribute is set to Yes, No, or No Value. In other words, it shows the tabulated percentages of the various Fulfilled values on all in-scope requirements.

  2. Total Estimates adds the number of estimates named in Estimates attribute in all the requirements, and depicts them in the chart according to their Priority settings. The application keeps count of the estimates entered in those requirements that In Scope is set to Yes.

Note: Click the Table view icon to display certain values quickly. Also, click the pie charts to go directly to the Table view. In Table view, the pie charts are visible, unless the pane is collapsed.

The attributes are defined as follows:

  • Priority default settings are Must Have, Should Have, and Nice to Have. The default settings can be renamed. (Since Priority is a list field, its settings are sorted alphabetically, so the order of the default settings are: Must Have; Nice to Have; Should Have.)

  • In Scope is set to Yes or No depending on the product manager evaluating whether this requirement must be included in the scope of the requirements specification. The application keeps count of the estimates entered in those requirements that In Scope is set to Yes. As long as In Scope is set to Yes, that requirement's Fulfilled setting is tabulated, and its Estimates value are included in the rolled up value, adjusting as the number of Estimates is adjusted. The "caution" symbol indicates "Some in-scope requirements that are counted in this requirements specification have no estimate."

  • Estimates is a numeric field, to be filled in with an integer value. Estimates can be thought of as Level Of Effort (LOE), and the product manager may dictate that the values reflect, for example, "man hours", "person days", or some other form of estimated LOE. Be aware of its relationship to the In Scope attribute.

  • Fulfilled can be set to Yes or No. If it's either not changed or returned to the blank setting, the application counts that as "No Value". The product manager may determine that a requirement has been described in sufficient detail for its purpose in the requirements specification, that its purpose is, in effect, fulfilled. For those requirements whose In Scope attribute is set to Yes, the Fulfilled settings are rolled up and depicted in the Fulfillment Status chart, allowing some tracking of how evolved the requirement is.

Let's say requirements specification RS-1 has three requirements, R-2, R-3, and R-4. These requirements have, respectively, 200, 300, and 400 as entered values for Estimates. As long as In Scope is set to Yes for R-2, R-3, and R-4, the total of Estimates in RS-1 is 900. If In Scope for requirement R-2 is set to No, however, the rolled up total of Estimates in RS-1 is 700.

Use the Table view to spot certain things more quickly, such as whether there's a requirement marked In Scope that has no value for Estimates. Use the Standard view to see the structure.

Note: The Standard view is dynamic, in that it refreshes as you make entries, without saving changes. The Table view isn't dynamic, and you have to click the Refresh icon to have your latest changes reflected in what you see, such as the pie charts.