I want a car! - Business requirements 101

If you work as a consultant or with a consultant or just need to get something done you will need to decide exactly what it is you need to do.  This is called a want or need.  In the business world we like to take emotions (yucky distracting things that they are) out of things so we call it a business requirement.  Unfortunately the brain is a super computer that works so fast at a subconscious level that most of the time we don't even realise what it's doing for us (or to us).  We intuitively leap from problem to solution in one step and state our problems in terms of solutions.

So we say "I need a car!" (preferably a Jaguar XK-RS), and not “I need to transport myself and up to three other people commonly within a radius of 100 km and within one hour from departure, departure. Times may not be known in advance so transport must be readily available.  It must also be comfortable and air-conditioned (and it doesn't matter if the people in the back are cramped and uncomfortable)”

"I need a car!" is not a statement of requirement but a solution to an assumed and unstated need, want or business requirement.  Compound enough requirements like this when you are trying to build a solution to a complex set of business issues and you drive into a thought cul de sac with no way out because you have already assumed the set of solutions to your problems without having uncovered your real requirements.  Only when you consider your requirements as a complete set, stated as either required capabilities or outcomes, can you develop the best possible solutions for your particular problems.

The statement above about transport requirement is really a capability statement where you are defining the sort of capability you need that will enable you to deliver a wide variety of (still unstated) outcomes.  So this may not be enough and you may need to dive down to the next level to uncover the key outcomes you are trying to achieve.  In this case it may need to be outcomes lilk:
"I need to get my kids to school by 8:30 AM Monday to Friday", "I need to get to work by 8:45 AM Monday to Friday"  "I need to be able to fit two dogs and luggage for four people into the transport twice a year for family holidays" (looks like the XK-RS is out then!)

Once you have drawn out all the capabilities required and outcomes to be achieved by a particular business process or function you can then design the solution to fulfil the requirements and apply the constraints of circumstance to refine it to something you can actually implement.

Need help to uncover your requirements and develop solutions to your logistics issues? find out more at www.logisticshelp.com