What questions we should ask during requirement elicitation?

Requirement elicitation is the process of gathering information about the needs and requirements of stakeholders for a project. It is an essential step in the project management process, as it helps to ensure that the project is aligned with the needs and goals of the stakeholders. During requirement elicitation, it is important to ask the right questions in order to gather accurate and relevant information.

Here are examples of some questions-

• What are the objectives of the project? This question helps to understand the overall purpose of the project and how it aligns with the goals of the stakeholders.
• Who are the stakeholders, sponsors and what are their roles in the project? This question helps to identify who will be impacted by the project and their level of involvement.
• What are the functional and no functional requirements? This question helps us to know about what should be the product features and what should be its surrounding’s support features.
• When you want the product to come into existence? This helps us to estimate the time, budget and manpower required for this.
• How you want the project to be implemented and what are the expected outcomes? This question helps to understand the overall approach to implementing the project and what success looks like.
• Why this project is needed to be implemented? what problem does this solve?
• What are the acceptance criteria for the project? This question helps to understand what needs to be done in order for the project to be considered complete and successful.
• What are the risks and issues associated with the project? This question helps to identify any potential problems that may arise during the project and how to mitigate them.
• How will the project be maintained and supported after it is completed? This question helps to understand the ongoing support and maintenance requirements of the project.
• How will the project be evaluated and measured for success? This question helps to understand how the project will be evaluated and measured for success.

Requirements elicitation is the most crucial initial step as it gives input, direction to our project. To make it easy we should make list of questions to ask before meeting. We should be patiently listening to client. Many a times to get detailed information we need to ask the same questions to many stakeholders.

We should focus on questions which will give us correct, complete and consistent answers.

All these questions could be asked during performing various requirements elicitation techniques, these are brainstorming, document analysis reverse engineering, focus groups, observation, workshops, joint application development, interview, prototyping and questionnaire. These techniques helps us to know what questions to ask, when to ask and to get which information.

By asking the right questions during requirement elicitation, you can gather accurate and relevant information about the needs and requirements of stakeholders. This information is essential for the success of the project, as it helps to ensure that the project is aligned with the needs and goals of the stakeholders, and that it will meet their expectations.