Roles and Responsibilities in REM - Requirements Engineering and Management for Software Development Projects - page 154

Table 11.1 Persons appropriate for requirements engineering activity project-wise

Project type Persons appropriate for requirements

engineering activity

Implementation of COTS project Functional specialists with training on the

respective COTS product

Full life cycle software development projects Functional specialists

Testing projects Functional specialists

Conversion/porting/migration projects Senior programmers

Partial life cycle projects—requirements
engineering

Functional specialists

Partial life cycle projects—software design,
construction and testing

Senior programmers

Partial life cycle projects—construction and
testing

Senior programmers

Real time software projects Senior programmers

Normally, the real time software is developed by technical people with engi-
neering qualification especially from electronics engineering or similar back-
ground. The requirements are all technical in nature.
The requirements engineering activity is therefore handled by technical persons
especially by senior programmers who handled similar projects earlier.
Table 11.1 enumerates the appropriate individuals to handle requirements
engineering activities.

11.2.3 Process

Another important aspect for which the organization owns the responsibility is
definition and continuous improvement of an appropriate process for the require-
ments engineering activity. While quality control activities uncover defects and
facilitate their correction, a well-defined process would ensure that quality is built
into the deliverables right during the engineering stage itself, and reduces the effort
spent on quality control besides facilitating improvement in the efficiency all around.
An organizational process consists of a network of procedures, standards,
guidelines, formats, templates and checklists.
A procedure consists of:

1. Step by step instructions on how to accomplish a specific task
2. Instructions to ensure that quality is built into the deliverable
3. Suggestions to prevent defects in the deliverable
4. Suggestions to ensure efficiency in the utilization of resources
5. The list of suggested quality control activities to ensure that the deliverable is
defect-free
6. References to associated standards, guidelines, formats, templates and check-
lists that can be used in performing the task