www.Open-RE.

org
Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Mastering CPRE
Acknowledgements and Bibliography

Syllabus for CPRE Foundation Level examination, IREB, Germany

Rupp, Klaus Pohl and Chris. A Study Guide for the Certified Professional
for Requirements Engineering Exam Foundation Level 2nd Edition. Rocky Nook
Inc., 2015. Kindle and Paperback.

A Guide to Business Analysis Body of Knowledge v2.0. International

Institute of Business Analysis. Toronto: IIBA, 2009. PDF and EBook.

A Guide to Business Analysis Body of Knowledge v3.0. International

Institute of Business Analysis. Toronto: IIBA, 2009. PDF and EBook.

Business Analysis, Debra and Paul, British Computer Society

Podeswa, Howard. The Business Analyst's Handbook. Boston: Course

Technology, 2009. Paperback.

UML for the IT Business Analyst, Second Edition. Boston: Course Technology,
2010. Paperback.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Copyright notice

CPRE is registered Trademarks of International Requirements

Engineering Board, Germany.

All trademarks of copyrights mentioned herein are the

possession of their respective owners.

We make no claim of ownership by the mention of products that

contain these marks.

Contents of this document should not be disclosed to any

unauthorized person.

This document may not, in whole or in part, be reduced,

reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, translated, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical.

This publication may be used in assisting aspirants for CPRE

examination. It does not warrant that use of this publication
will ensure passing the CPRE examination.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Preface and Introduction

As the book title suggests, this book is a guidebook for

the aspirants of the CPRE examination from IREB, Germany.

We value your time and hence the book is designed to be

extremely specific Help you pass the certification
examination with least possible effort.

This book is authored by a qualified CPRE trainer who has

helped many other participants clear the CPRE examination
in the very first attempt. He is also trainer for CPRE
preparations in both corporate and public workshops and
have trained thousands of participants across the world
USA, Australia, Middle East, South East Asia, Europe and
Africa.

The book will soon be followed by an exhaustive question

bank and audio book to further assist participants.

Feedbacks and suggestions on the book

We will be glad and thankful if you can share your

feedbacks and suggestions on the book. Please your
feedbacks and suggestions to [email protected]

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

About the Author

LN Mishra (LN) has 22 years of professional experience in

software product development, requirements analysis,
business analysis, governance, risk and compliance
management (CMMI, ISO9001, ISO27001, HIPAA and Six-Sigma).

LN is a practicing requirements engineer and business

analyst for more than 15 years. He was involved in multiple
multi-country large ERP implementation projects. He
currently consults in development of 2 large systems - one
of the largest paint companies in the world to develop
their next generation color management system and
development of a GRC system. He is also the product manager
for an enterprise Governance, Risk and Compliance
management system (GRCPerfect) which is operational in
multiple client places.

He was involved in one of the worlds change management

program in PricewaterhouseCoopers, a leading management
consulting firm, in one of the largest privatization effort
in India for a public sector utility agency.

LN has conducted more than 100 workshops, both public and

in house in the areas of Business Analysis, Requirements
Management, Agile Project Management, software Project

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Management, Six Sigma, CMM, ISO 9001 and ISO 27001. He has
also guided 30+ six sigma green belt projects in iGate,
MACH and Akzo Nobel.

LN holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) from

IIM Ahmedabad, the too-most business management school in
India and Bachelor in Engineering (Honors) in Electronics
and Telecommunication from University College of
Engineering, Burla, India.

Major Awards/Recognitions:
Certified Requirements Engineering Professional (CPRE)
from IREB, Germany
Certified Business Analyst Professional (CBAP) from
IIBA, Canada.
Certified Project Management Professional (PMP) from
PMI, USA
Certified Scrum Master from Good Agile, USA
World Topper Certified software Quality Analyst (CSQA),
2000
Certified Lead Auditor for ISO 9001, ISO 27001, ISO
20000 and BS 25999

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Clients for whom LN has consulted and mentored

LN lives with his wife, Ananya, son, Siddharth and

daughter, Saianshee in Bangalore, the IT capital of India.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. All about CPRE....................................................... 14

What and why of CPRE.................................................... 14

What is IREB?........................................................... 14

Prerequisite for CPRE................................................... 15

Preparation............................................................. 15

Certification examination............................................... 16

Examination results..................................................... 16

2. Introduction and foundation.......................................... 18

2.1. Symptoms of and reasons for inadequate re.......................... 18

Need for good requirements engineering.................................. 18

Costs of requirements error fixing...................................... 19

Defining requirements................................................... 19

Defining requirements engineering....................................... 20

Symptoms of poor requirements engineering............................... 21

Causes of poor requirements engineering................................. 21

2.2. Four major activities of requirements engineers.................... 23

Different levels of requirements........................................ 24

2.3. Role of communication in requirements engineering.................. 28

Impact of communication mediums in requirements engineering............. 29

2.4. Skills of requirements engineers................................... 30

Responsibilities of requirements engineers.............................. 30

Skills of requirements engineers........................................ 31

2.5. Three (3) types of requirements.................................... 35

Functional requirements................................................. 35

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Non-functional (quality, supplementary) requirements.................... 37

Constraints............................................................. 39

3. Systems and system contexts.......................................... 41

3.1. System, system context and boundaries.............................. 41

What is a system?....................................................... 41

What is context?........................................................ 42

What is system context?................................................. 42

3.2. Determining system and context boundaries.......................... 46

System boundary and its gray zone..................................... 46

Context boundary and its gray zone.................................... 48

Gray zone in system boundary............................................ 49

Gray zone in context boundary........................................... 50

4. Requirements elicitation............................................. 52

4.1. Requirements sources............................................... 52

Significance of requirements sources.................................... 52

Consequences of unconsidered sources.................................... 52

Types of requirements sources........................................... 53

Important information of the stakeholder documentation.................. 54

Stakeholder management process.......................................... 56

Ensuring agreement with stakeholders.................................... 57

Principles in dealing with stakeholders................................. 58

Stakeholders rights and duties.......................................... 59

4.2. Requirements categorization according to kano model................ 61

4.3. Elicitation techniques............................................. 63

Factors influencing choice of elicitation techniques.................... 63

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

RE techniques based on type of requirements............................. 64

RE techniques based on level of detail required......................... 64

RE techniques based on availability of stakeholders..................... 66

RE techniques based on risks of project................................. 66

RE techniques based on complexity of the project........................ 66

Survey techniques (interviews, workshops, questionnaires)............... 67

Creativity techniques (brainstorming, brainstorming paradox, change of

perspective, analogy techniques)........................................ 70

Document-centric techniques............................................. 76

Observation techniques.................................................. 80

Support techniques...................................................... 83

5. Documenting requirements............................................ 101

5.1. Document design................................................... 101

Reasons for documentation.............................................. 101

5.2. Documentation types............................................... 103

Three perspectives of functional requirements.......................... 103

Requirements documentation using natural language...................... 105

Requirements documentation using conceptual models..................... 105

Hybrid requirements documents.......................................... 106

5.3. Document structures............................................... 107

Standardized document structures....................................... 107

Customized standard contents........................................... 109

5.4. Use of requirements documents..................................... 112

5.5. Quality criteria for requirements documents....................... 114

5.6. Quality criteria for requirements................................. 116

Basic rules to enhance readability of requirements..................... 118

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

5.7. Glossary.......................................................... 120

Benefits of glossary:.................................................. 120

Rules for using a glossary............................................. 121

6. Documenting requirements in natural languages....................... 123

6.1. Language effects.................................................. 123

Mastering and using five transformational effects...................... 123

Transformational effects............................................... 124

6.2. Requirement construction using templates.......................... 128

7. Model-based requirements documentation.............................. 133

7.1. The term model.................................................... 135

Model and its properties............................................... 135

Elements of a conceptual modelling language............................ 137

7.2. Modeling requirement using goals.............................. 138

7.3. Use cases......................................................... 140

Modelling using use case diagrams...................................... 140

Use case specifications................................................ 143

7.4. Three modeling perspectives on requirements....................... 147

7.5. Requirements modeling in data perspective......................... 147

7.6. Requirements modeling in functional perspective................... 151

Data flow diagrams..................................................... 151

UML activity diagrams.................................................. 153

7.7. Requirements modeling in behavioral perspective................... 156

UML state diagrams..................................................... 156

8. Requirements validation and negotiation............................. 158

8.1. Fundamentals of requirements validations.......................... 159

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Significance of validating requirements................................ 159

8.2. Fundamentals of requirements negotiations......................... 161

Significance of requirements conflicts................................. 161

8.3. Quality aspects of requirements................................... 162

3 quality aspects of requirements...................................... 162

Using validation criteria for the quality aspects...................... 162

8.4. Principles of requirements validation............................. 165

Six principles of requirements validations............................. 165

Using principles of requirements validations........................... 165

8.5. Techniques for requirements validations........................... 168

Techniques for requirements validations................................ 168

Using techniques for requirements validations.......................... 168

8.6. Requirements negotiation.......................................... 173

Activities for requirements negotiation................................ 173

Types of requirements conflicts........................................ 173

Conflict resolution techniques......................................... 175

Documentation of conflict resolution techniques........................ 177

9. Requirements management............................................. 179

9.1. Assigning attributes to requirements.............................. 180

Attribute schemes...................................................... 180

Purpose and definition of attribute schemes............................ 180

Template for attribute scheme.......................................... 181

Project-specific tailoring of attribute scheme......................... 181

Important attribute types for requirements............................. 182

9.2. Views on requirements............................................. 185

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

9.3. Prioritizing requirements......................................... 187

Methods for requirements prioritization................................ 187

Requirements prioritization techniques................................. 188

Ranking and top-ten technique.......................................... 188

Single-criterion classification........................................ 188

Kano classification.................................................... 189

Prioritization matrix (wiegers matrix)................................. 190

9.4. Requirements traceability......................................... 191

Benefits of requirements traceability.................................. 191

Three types of traceability relationships.............................. 192

Representing requirements traceability................................. 193

9.5. Versioning of requirements........................................ 195

Requirements versions.................................................. 195

Requirements configurations............................................ 196

Properties of requirements configurations.............................. 196

Requirements baselines................................................. 197

9.6. Management of requirements changes................................ 198

Importance of requirements changes..................................... 198

Change control board................................................... 198

Change request (CR).................................................... 199

Classification of incoming change requests............................. 200

Basic method for CRs................................................... 201

9.7. Measurement for requirements...................................... 203

10. Requirements tools................................................. 205

10.1. Types of tools................................................... 205

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Tools during system development........................................ 205

Tools to structure, present, visualize and simulate requirements models 206

Features of requirements management tools.............................. 207

Standard office tools.................................................. 208

Specialized requirements management tools.............................. 209

10.2. Introducing tools................................................ 209

10.3. Evaluating tools................................................. 211

Project view........................................................... 211

User view.............................................................. 211

Product view........................................................... 212

Process view........................................................... 212

Provider view.......................................................... 212

Technical view......................................................... 212

Economic view.......................................................... 212

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

1. All about CPRE

What and Why of CPRE

CPRE stands for Certified Professional in Requirements

Engineering, a certification provided by International
requirements Engineering Board (IREB), Germany
(www.IREB.org). This is the most widely acknowledged
certification for requirements engineers. There are more
than 20000 requirements engineering professionals certified
in CPRE Foundation Level examination world-wide.

Following are some of the benefits of becoming a CPRE

Be recognized for your competency in requirements
engineering.
Requirements engineering is a growing career
opportunity for IT professionals.
Stakeholders with domain experience can join IT sector
by becoming requirements engineers.
Better job prospects.
Better salary.

What is IREB?

International requirements Engineering Board (IREB) was

founded in Germany in to support the requirements
engineering community by:
Creating and developing awareness and recognition of

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

the value and contribution of the requirements

engineers.
Providing a forum for knowledge sharing and
contribution to the requirements engineering
profession.
Publicly recognizing and certifying qualified
practitioners through an internationally acknowledged
certification programs such as CPRE foundation
Level, CPRE-Advanced Level and CPRE-Expert Level.

Prerequisite for CPRE

The only formal prerequisite for admission to the

Foundation Level Exam is having a valid identity card or
passport. Please take your ID document to the exam for
proof of identity. For answering the exam questions
correctly, you need to know the content of the
defined Foundation Level syllabus. Taking a training
course is not a requirement for admission to the test but
is recommended by the IREB.

Preparation

One can prepare for the exam

By attending a CPRE training with a training provider.
The training should take at least three days and be
conducted by a training provider recognized by IREB.

By preparing individually in self-study.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

By downloading the practice exam from IREB.org. The

practice examination contains 34 questions in the same
format as the live examination. Additionally to the
questionnaire the download contains solutions and
correction aids as well.

By having a look at the exam regulations for the

Foundation Level. Please notice the regulations
regarding negative scoring for incorrect answers!

Certification examination

The exam takes 75 minutes. In this time, one has to answer

45 multiple choice questions. The questions are of
differing difficulty and therefore assigned differing
amounts of points. The exam is closed-book, i.e. no
materials are allowed to be used. To pass the exam, one
must achieve at least than 60% of the total score possible.
The exam is conducted by a licensed certification body.
The exam can be taken in Chinese (Mandarin), Dutch,
English, French, German, Spanish and Portuguese (Brazil).

Examination results

Exam results are checked by the certification body. Results

are dispatched to the personal address stated on the
application. If one has passed the exam, one will receive
the certificate together with the results. If one takes the
exam online, one gets the results right after the
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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

examination. The certificate is delivered via post. The

certificates achieved via online exam are dispatched within
the same period of time the results of conventional exams
are sent.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

2. Introduction and foundation

2.1. Symptoms of and reasons for inadequate RE

Need for good requirements engineering

As per a study by TechRepublic

(http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/tech-decision-
maker/study-68-percent-of-it-projects-fail/), it is
estimated that around 68% of projects fail due to poor
requirements engineering. Majority of customer expectation
mismatches can be attributed to poor requirements.

Hence, it is extremely essential that we focus on

identifying and documenting complete requirements for all
projects.

As per the TechRepublic study mentioned above, two third of

system errors in production are due to requirements errors.
Developers develop solutions as per their understanding of
requirements. Unclear, incomplete, or wrong requirements
lead to development of wrong solutions.

Complete and correct requirements are the basis for

successful system development. Discovering gaps in
requirements early avoids tedious change control processes.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Costs of requirements error fixing

Costs of fixing requirements defects usually increase

exponentially with each passing project phase. For
instance, the effort to fix a requirements defect is up to
20 times higher if the correction is done during
programming as opposed to fixing the same defect during
requirements engineering phase. If the defect is fixed
during acceptance testing, effort involved may be 100 times
higher. This is especially true of non-functional
requirements as non-functional requirements tend to affect
system architecture more than functional requirements.

Before we delve into why poor requirements are developed,

let us understand Requirements first.

Defining requirements

IEEE defines requirements as:

A condition or capability needed by a stakeholder to
solve a problem or achieve an objective.
A condition or capability to be met or possessed by a
solution or solution component to satisfy a contract,
standard, specification, or other formally imposed
documents.
A requirement may be unstated, implied by or derived
from other requirements, or directly stated and managed.
One of the key objectives of requirements engineering is
to ensure requirements are visible to and understood by
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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

all stakeholders.

Requirements describe, but not limited to, past, present

and future conditions or capabilities in an enterprise,
organizational structures, roles, processes, policies,
rules and information systems. Requirements should be at
the level of depth necessary for clarity and
implementation.

A domain is the area undergoing analysis, boundaries of an

organization and external stake-holders and their
interactions.

Defining requirements engineering

Requirements engineering is a systematic and disciplined

approach to the specification and management of
requirements with the following goals:

1. Identifying relevant requirements,

2. Achieving stakeholder consensus on requirements,
3. Documenting requirements according to given standards
and
4. Manage requirements systematically.

Source: [Rupp, Klaus Pohl and Chris 2015]

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Requirements engineers analyze and synthesize information

provided by customers, staff, IT professionals and
executives. They elicit the actual needs of stakeholders,
not simply capture their expressed desires. Requirements
engineering activities may be performed in many job titles
or organizational roles.

Requirements engineering practitioners include requirements

engineers, business systems analysts, systems analysts,
product managers, product owners, enterprise analysts,
business architects, management consultants and interaction
design professionals.

Symptoms of poor requirements engineering

Key symptoms for inadequate requirements engineering are:

System not used,
User dissatisfaction with developed system,
System not meeting stakeholder needs,
Features needed by stakeholder not needed getting
implemented.
Work executed though workarounds.

Causes of poor requirements engineering

Most common reason for poor requirements are:

Assumption that requirements are obvious and hence need
not be stated explicitly,
Improper communication from stakeholders to business

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

analysts and then to designers and developers,

Tendency to begin design and coding to speed-up the
project implementation without proper requirements
gathering,
Inadequate time allotted for requirements engineering,
Lack of appropriate skills for requirements elicitation,
Inadequate templates available for requirements
elicitation,
Inadequate level of detailing needed for solution
requirements.

Please watch a very interesting video on problems with

requirementshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqkQrPmsP2w

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

2.2. Four major activities of requirements

engineers

Elicitation

Elicitation means to Understand underlying needs and

To draw forth to enquire till all necessary
information are obtained.

Key objectives for elicitation are:

Elicit requirements from stakeholders and other sources
using different elicitation techniques.
Elicit various attributes of requirements.

Documentation

Key objective for documentation is to document elicited

requirements correctly reflecting stakeholders needs.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Validation and negotiation

Key objective for Validation and negotiation is to ensure

documented requirements meet requirements quality criteria.

Requirements management

Requirements management is an ongoing activity which spans

across all other requirements activities, such as
elicitation, documentation and validation.

Key objectives for requirements management are:

Manage requirements from creation till decommissioning
of requirements,
Prioritize requirements,
Structure requirements,
Manage requirements changes.

Source: [Rupp, Klaus Pohl and Chris 2015]

Different levels of requirements

Requirements are usually provided at 3 levels:

Business, Stakeholder and System.

Requirements Description
classification

Business Higher-level statements of needs, goals

requirements or objectives, why a project has been

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

initiated; its objectives, metrics,

needs of the organization as a whole.
For example: Adaptive to introduce
trainings for global customers.

Stakeholder Needs of a particular stakeholder or

requirements class of stakeholders and how they
interact with a solution. A bridge
between business requirements and
solution requirements. For example,
requirements from Trainer: An web-based
platform to conduct web-based training.

Solution Characteristics of the solution that

requirements meets business requirements and
stakeholder requirements. Categorized
into be functional and non-functional.

Functional requirements describe

behavior and information that the
solution will manage, capabilities that
the system will be able to perform in
terms of its behaviors or operations,
specific IT application actions or
responses. Typically linked to business
processes or operations that the
organization manages.

Must provide video, audio and text

based interaction between trainer and

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

participants.
Must have provision for both online
and off-line interactions.
Non-functional requirements, also known
as quality or supplementary
requirements, capture environmental
conditions under which the solution must
remain effective, or qualities that the
systems must have rather than the
behavior or functionality of the
solution. For example, requirements
related to capacity, speed, security,
availability, information architecture
and UI presentation.

Must have availability of more than

99.9% time for the workshop duration.
Transition Capabilities needed to facilitate
requirements transition from current state of the
enterprise to a desired future state,
but not be needed once the transition is
complete. These requirements are
temporary in nature and cannot be
developed until both an existing and new
solution are defined. Typical transition
requirements include data conversion
from existing systems, skill gaps to be

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

addressed etc.

Training of trainers on the new web-

based platform.

[Source: Business Analysis Body of

Knowledge, IIBA Canada, v2.0]

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

2.3. Role of communication in requirements

engineering
Natural languages are the most common and important means
to communicate requirements. However, stakeholders
understand natural language requirements differently due to
their knowledge and background. Natural language
communication effectiveness depends on familiarity of
stakeholders on the subject, their past experiences,
cultural and educational backgrounds, etc.

Hence, it is important to develop common terminology

(glossary) and defined requirements constructs, i.e.
describe requirements using a standard structure, while
communicating in natural language. Expressing requirements
using standard constructs helps in not forgetting essential
information while using natural languages.

Requirements engineers can take help of modeling languages

such as Unified Modeling Language (UML) and Business
Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) which reduces ambiguity in
communication using natural language.

[Rupp, Klaus Pohl and Chris 2015]

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Impact of communication mediums in requirements

engineering

Communication mediums (written or spoken) have significant

effect in requirements communication (or miscommunication).
When communicating in natural languages, all stakeholders
MUST consciously focus on direct and simple communication.
In verbal communication, success of the communication
relies on expressed language, gestures and feedbacks. But
in written communication, these are absent. Many often,
requirements may be communicated incorrectly due to natural
transformations that occur during human perceptions

[Rupp, Klaus Pohl and Chris 2015]

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
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2.4. Skills of requirements engineers

Responsibilities of requirements engineers

Before we understand skills for requirements engineers, it

is essential to understand responsibilities for
requirements engineers. Following are the key
responsibilities for requirements engineers:
Understand business domain as well as technology
domain,
Act as the connecting links between business
stakeholders and technology implementation
stakeholders,
Plan requirements engineering activities in
collaboration with stakeholders,
Speak the language of the stakeholders,
Be able to communicate requirements (e.g., by means
of diagrams and graphs),
Create requirements documents,
Maintain respectful relationships with stakeholders,
Present ideas and alternatives as well as their
realizations,
Make systems user-friendly and simple,
Ensure systems satisfy functional and non-functional
requirements,

Plan and organize requirements communications,

Take additional responsibilities towards Domain SME,

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Project Manager and Tester if needed.

Skills of requirements engineers

Requirements engineer is a key project role. Usually they

are the ONLY ones who are in contact with all the
stakeholders, from sponsor, to Domain SMEs and
Implementation SMEs. Requirements engineers need more than
only requirements engineering process knowledge. 3 key
skill areas for REs are behavioral, process and technical.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Requirements engineers MUST acquire following skills:

Communication skills

Good communication skills are essential to elicit

requirements and communicate them in a suitable manner.
Requirements engineers must be able to listen, ask right
questions at right time, notice when a statement does not
contain desired information and make further inquiries when
necessary.

Knowledge of documentation and presentation tools

Requirements engineers MUST become familiar with

documentation and presentation tools.

Knowledge of modeling tools

Requirements engineers MUST become familiar requirements

modeling tools and techniques. Requirements modeling

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

techniques help in reducing requirements ambiguity.

Analytical thinking

Analytical thinking allows requirements engineers to group

and analyze requirements at the right level.

Empathy

Empathy for stakeholders helps in building personal

connects with stakeholders.

Conflict resolution skills

Conflicts are common during requirements engineering. They

could be due to differing opinions among stakeholders with
respect to value, priority of requirements. Requirements
engineers MUST identify and record conflicts and use
suitable techniques to resolve conflicts.

Moderation / Facilitation skills

Requirements engineers must be able to mediate between

different opinions and lead discussions during individual
and group conversations. They should anticipate problems
that might arise in such situations and act accordingly.

Requirements engineers MUST be able to represent

requirements in different fora. They MUST consolidate
differing opinions, facilitate a decision in case of
disagreements and create consensus among the stakeholders.

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
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Self-confidence

Requirements engineers are exposed to criticisms as well.

Requirements engineers need high level of self-confidence
and should have the ability to defend themselves. They
should NEVER take criticism personally.

Ability to convince

Requirements engineers should be able to convince

stakeholders the need to prioritize requirements as per
agreed upon criteria and need for realizing maximum value
from requirements in shortest possible time.

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
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2.5. Three(3) types of requirements

Functional requirements

Functional requirements (FRs) describe abilities of a system

that are important to user community. These are
functionalities offered by the system. Sample examples of
functional requirements are Manage customer, Manage
order, Manage employees etc.

Categories of functional requirements are:

Data perspective: (Data)

In the data perspective, data aspects are described.

Functional perspective: (Logic)

Functional perspectives describe data flows or logic flows
of the system.

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Behavioral perspective:(State)
In the behavioral perspective, statuses of data elements are
described.

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The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
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Non-Functional (Quality, Supplementary) requirements

The umbrella term non-functional requirement is often

used for quality requirements and constraints. Quality
requirements describe qualities of a system that are
important to:
User community, such as usability, learnability,
reliability, etc.
Development community, such as scalability,
maintainability, reusability, etc.

Quality requirements often influence the system

architecture more than functional requirements do. Quality
requirements must be documented explicitly. Quality
requirements should be traceable to business needs and
other requirements. Include appropriate measures for NFRs
to be testable.

Quality requirements are mostly documented using natural

language.For example:
90% of users shall be able to use basic functions of the
system within 6 hours of training.
The system shall provide 90% of responses in less than 5
seconds.

Performance

Time taken to perform activities and resource utilization

levels.

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Security

Ability to ensure appropriate confidentiality and integrity

of information, to verify when actions were taken and by
whom and to authenticate users.

Reliability

Measure of application being available when needed.

Includes ability of the application to recover from errors,
uptime, or failures in interfaces.

Usability

The system being usable by target audience with specified

duration of training.

Maintainability

Ability to change one component without affecting others

and without causing unexpected failures, ability to re-use
components and testability.

Portability, also known as Transferability

Ease of installing and uninstalling the application,

different environments it can run and ease of migrating it
to a new environment.

A useful mnemonic: CRM POST (Compatibility, Reliability,

Maintainability, Performance efficiency, Operability,
Security and Transferability)

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Mastering CPRE
The essential guide to succeed in Certified Professional in
Requirements Engineering examination

Constraints

Constraints are aspects which project team cannot influence

or modify. (e.g., The system shall be implemented using
.net) or the time frame (The system shall be available
by fourth quarter of 2015). Constraints are not
implemented; they are adhered to. Constraints limit the
solution options (which is actually a good thing else we
will have large number of solution options to deal with).
Constraints influence requirements engineering planning,
execution and techniques.

In addition to the above classifications, requirements may

be classified based on requirement attributes, such as the
levels of detail, priorities, or legal obligations.

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