Requirements Documentation MVC - Usability Testing

What’s this issue all about?

We believe there's value in providing users a way to document and manage requirements for both regulated and non-regulated industries. Users in regulated industries often require a way to manage requirements. Additionally, users in non-regulated industries often desire a way to assess completeness/correctness through testing - which would lend itself to documenting requirements.

The purpose of this issue is to evaluate the usability of MVC design proposal and identify additional opportunities for improvement.

Who is the target user of the feature?

  • Higher-level requirements are defined by System Architects with input from software engineering (and sometimes safety engineers).
  • Lower-level requirements are often defined and/or implemented by the engineers.
  • For more regulated industries, quality management is involved throughout the lifecycle. Additionally, test engineers will utilize tracing (and further into the process, create trace to test procedures).
  • For less regulated industries (e.g. SaaS products like GitLab), requirements are defined by Product Managers during the validation phase with input from UX. This is done based on user interviews and product knowledge.

What questions are you trying to answer?

Methodology

Usability Testing with 6-10 users from both regulated and non-regulated industries.

  • Participant Profile
    • Regulated industries such as automotive, government, healthcare, finance
    • Non-regulated industries (e.g. SaaS products)
    • Enterprise orgs ideally, smaller businesses welcome
    • Product Managers, System Administrators, Software Engineers
    • Using tools such as Jama, Confluence, Excel, IBM Doors

What hypotheses and/or assumptions do you have?

What decisions will you make based on the research findings?

Proceed with implementing the Requirements Management MVC gitlab#32733 (closed).

When do you need this research to be completed? (Milestone or date)

Links

Progress

  • Nick: Create a recruitment request [Deadline: TBD]
  • Nick: Create screener survey and assign to Research Coordinator [Deadline: TBD]
  • Research Coordinator: Schedule participants [Deadline: TBD]
  • Nick: Finalize prototype [Deadline: TBD]
  • Nick: Draft script for usability testing based on prototype [Deadline: TBD]
    • Mike, Katherine: Review and finalize testing script [Deadline: TBD]
  • Nick, Mark: Conduct usability testing sessions [Deadline: TBD]
    • Nick: Open an Incentive request issue using the template in the UX Research project [Deadline: TBD]
  • Nick, Mark: Analyze notes and synthesize findings [Deadline: TBD]
    • Mike: Product Design Manager reviews findings and provides feedback if needed.[Deadline: TBD]
  • Nick: Document insights as issues in the Insights Repository [Deadline: TBD]

Insights from this usability study can be found under the Dovetail project: https://dovetailapp.com/projects/311cf999-aa28-4be3-a765-cbaa98c24368/data/b/e6cf204d-823d-4434-8651-11c6ab7e2629

Epic for tracking changes to Requirements Management based on research findings: &3708

Edited by Nick Brandt