Challenges in Contemporary Requirements Practice

The management of requirements remains a key source of difficulty in systems development projects. Substantive changes in the practice of systems development and associated requirements engineering efforts suggest that a reconsideration of prevailing requirements challenges is warranted. In this essay, we report on a field study of practicing design professionals in which we assess the key challenges they experience in developing a stable set of system requirements. Building upon the findings from our study, we propose a framework for understanding contemporary requirements challenges and the ways in which they are fundamentally interrelated.