End of term entry

1.  Given your knowledge and experience at the end of these courses, which course objectives did you master?

• Understand the place of requirements gathering in the project lifecycle.

I learned that requirement gathering tasks place during the whole lifecycle in some way shape or form. 

•  Illustrate and demonstrate the processes of discovering, eliciting and managing requirements.

Don't know if I am an expert but I did learn the different processes that can be used to gather requirements. I learned how to identify good, high level requirements.  There needs to be a requirement plan developed to manage requirements. Involve all stakeholders when gathering requirements. Plan for change.

• Discuss and evaluate the role of the Project Manager in requirements gathering.

PM's need to demand and facilitate good requirements analysis. PM's need to support those performing the act so that a greater proportion of the project's resourses can be allocated to the requirements process. PM's must take on the discovered requirements along with the assumptions and risks that may arise to build and strengthen the projects plan. PM must make sure that his people use the right practices, methods, techniques, tools and templates.  PM can make sure that the correct requirements have been gathered. Also that all the requirements were gathered.

• Apply best practices in gathering and managing requirements.

The best practices takes leadership and coaching by dedicated PM's.  They need to guide the people outside the project so not to put more pressure on the project members. Contribute to your own quest to gain more success as well as job fulfillment.  Identify the real requirements, control requirements and their changes, invest in the requirement process, inspire teamwork, establish an attitude of continuous improvement among all members of staff.

• Effectively prioritize requirements.

Using your experts, the ones that are most likely to work with requirements, you pick those requirements that are the most important from a business standpoint.  Considerations like cost, value, risks, implementation difficulty and others must be evaluated to prioritize requirments.

• Examine the relationship between requirements gathering and project success.

The lack of good requirements, complete requirements and real requirements can cause a project to fail.  Good requirements are the basis of a solid project.

2.  Given your knowledge and experience at the end of these courses, which course objectives still look troublesome to you?

#8-Identify and apply processes for measuring and reporting project success
#4-Explain the process of defining requirements in various development methodologies, including agile development.

3.  What obstacles did you run into during the course? How did you try to overcome them?
I had to overcome the discipline it takes to take a online course.  I am used to classrooms and had to figure out how to split my time up into workable segments.  I also started a new job at the same time class started.  I was training on the job learning new and hard things, then I went home and tried to get through the homework.  This class had more homework than I have ever had before.  But now I can't go to bed unless I do my homework or part of it.

4.  How do you feel here at the end of a term as you look at your efforts and accomplishments? 
I am proud of myself. I conquered work and school. I loved this class and looked forward to the homework. Some homework was harder than the other but I knew I could do it. Sometimes I had to walk away from the task, think about, then retry working on it.

5.  What did your learn this semester and how will you use that in your current or future work?
I learned that I could do anything I set my mind to. I learned to take one task at a time and conquer it and move on.  I learned to read the instructions or requests carefully, disect each part and master it step by step.  My instructor taught me that. I also learned that requirement gathering is very important. In fact is the most critical process of a project. Projects have such a low success rate.  We learned so much in this class that can help with the success rate. One must wonder are the corporations using these methods and processes in their attempt to implement change?  They cannot be.  Your success rate cannot improve if you don't use the proven methods out there.  Are they incorporating risk management?  If they don't protect their project, they cannot control the threats that can affect it.  To control the threats (risks) means your project has a better chance to succeed.