The future of requirements gathering

The decade of 2010 and beyond offers promising changes for requirements gathering.  I see a few key "themes" emerging:

No More Requirements "Super Heroes"

The requirements management process within companies will become more standardized and repeatable.  The success of a project will not depend on "Super Hero" consultants or employees needed to "champion" the process. 

Requirements engineers who are very experienced and skilled at facilitating requirements JAD sessions, however, will be as valuable as good project managers and good developers.    Skilled analysts will be used rightly and less experienced analysts will be given assignments with lower complexity and less scope. 

Easy to Use Requirements Management Tools

Projects will be formed quickly, results accomplished, and then new teams with different skills formed for the next project.   Requirements management tools must be easy to use - so easy that barely any training is required (or at best, online training). 

Standardization

Processes will become more standardized.   Requirements engineers will train and qualify for industry "certification" of their skills.    Unfortunately, for those who enjoy the "craft" of requirements engineering, they will seek other occupations as requirements management becomes more administrative and routine.

Emergence of the "Modeled" Enterprise

Businesses will evolve from a "project" orientation to an overall model of the enterprise.   Key business processes will be "modeled" to support strategy.    Changes to the business model will involve "checking out" process models from a change management repository, then "checking in" future state process models.    

Businesses will maintain process models for key business processes in the organization.   Changes will be viewed as "scoped releases" of change to the overall enterprise, not as individual free standing projects.

Challenges Ahead 2010 to 2020 

I do not believe we will achieve a "utopia" of requirements management in the next decade. Businesses will continue along a path of maturing their ability to manage business processes and technical changes in a predictable, repeatable way. 

We will become more "economical" however.   Changes to many business processes affecting the enterprise will be modeled and accepted by key stakeholders in a matter of days rather than weeks or months. 

Complex changes to the enterprise that affect different departments, vendors, partners in the value change will occur on a regular basis.   Our ability to manage and implement these changes quickly and correctly will be key to staying competitive both nationally and globally.