Requirements Clinic: Analyzing the Results of Business Analysis

A requirements clinic is a focused inspection of a set of business requirements, often led by an external facilitator or a third party. The goal is to assess stakeholder alignment on requirements and evaluate the requirements for:

  • Completeness
  • Consistency
  • Clarity
  • Contradictions
  • Undocumented assumptions
  • Requirements gaps

Requirements clinics, when supported by the leadership and facilitated by a professional, provide a substantial value in many scenarios:

  • Complex initiatives with a large scope, especially in waterfall methodology or when a requirements package is to be handed off to a third party
  • Requirements analysis phase is resumed after a hiatus
  • There was a significant personnel change on the project (project or business side, or both)
  • The requirements are a combined effort of a team of analysts that have not always worked cohesively
  • Project team is geographically distributed
  • Previous projects in the organization have failed or had requirements challenges
  • The enterprise is undergoing a significant change, whether due to internal drivers (business model change) or external (major market disruption)

Requirements clinics are not just walkthroughs. Think of them as analysis on steroids – analyzing the results of business analysis.

An effective requirements clinic will offer many benefits:

A requirements clinic can be facilitated by a consultant, an experienced business analyst from another project, or a business architect.

It is a wise investment into the success of a project, as well as into the maturity of the business analysis function in an organization.

Why Change Consulting offers requirements clinics as a service – reach out for details.

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