What are the Questions to be considered before choosing requirement management software?

What are the Questions to be considered before choosing requirement management software?

Choosing any software for your business purpose requires careful analysis and considerations. In the similar manner, requirement management software is important software beneficial to the company analysts. Good requirements are essential for a streamlined workflow, enhanced communication with no unimplemented features and documents.

Before you choose RM software, it is essential to carefully analyze some of the questions before taking the final decision.

  • Is the application easy to use? – No matter how much the RM software’s are packed with features, it cannot be considered as useful if it is not user friendly. You can understand the user-friendliness of the application just by looking at its interface.
  • Is it customizable? – Every project has different requirements and the solutions that are currently available may not fulfill all the requirements. Instead of spending too much money on custom built solutions, the best option will be to go for customized software. However, the customization rate will depend on how much requirements of the team and the goals that you are willing to achieve with the RM software.
  • Is it web based? – Internet is becoming one of the places where we sort out majority of the daily tasks. The web applications are power-packed with chat engines, office applications, RM tools as well as task management tools. The advantage of using web based software is the easy accessibility. The requirement documents can be reviewed and can be accessed by the stakeholders from any part of the world. They can also put forward their views and comments and sign off as and when required.
  • Will it support traceability? – RM software needs to provide backward and forward traceability where there is a need of tracing a huge number of requirements. Tracing requirements include forward traceability which means tracing the requirement frontward to the deliverables and backward traceability means tracing the requirements back to its purposes and intentions. This is where the importance of RM tool steps into the picture. The efforts needed for Requirement management becomes simpler with RM tool. Traceability is an important component to keep a track on the changes in requirements.
  • Can it assimilate with other applications? – RM software is considered as a desired one that will be able to integrate with other applications and tools in your business.
  • Will it support requirements methodology? – The RM software should be in tune with the practice that you adopt for business analysis. There won’t be any boost in the productivity if the software is not aligned to the flow of work.

Bonnie Baldwin