Requirements management is the process of analyzing, formulating, and prioritizing project requirements, upon which a plan is laid out which ensures all requirements are confirmed to as needed.
What does a Requirements Manager do?
A requirements manager is responsible for the efficient development of complex systems that meet the requirements of a project or product. Additionally, they are also responsible for the optimization of the required processes.
Basically, requirements management includes the subject areas of requirements engineering and business analysis. For example, a requirements manager is significantly involved in the low-error and efficient development of complex systems, languages, and standards.
The manager formulates requirement specifications, which create a common understanding of processes and systems to be developed between contractor and client.
Looking for a Requirements Manager?
What are the Responsibilities of a Requirements Manager?
Daily tasks and activities for a Requirements Manager include ensuring that IT development processes are carried out in accordance with the requirements of the customers – within specified framework conditions.
They do by taking into account economic, operational, IT, security, process flows, and the associated time and resource planning. In this way, requirements managers ensure smooth workflows and transparent communication with customers, internal departments, and external parties.
What are the responsibilities typically included in a job description?
- Carrying out classic requirements analyses
- Formulation of requirements
- Review and creation of requirement specifications or user stories and identification of improvement potential
- Optimization of the requirement processes
- Execution of requirement reviews
- Documentation of system requirements
- Ensure compliance with industry standards (e.g. Automotive with ISO 26262 and Automotive SPICE)
- Validation of specifications and errors in requirement management tools such as DOORS
Hard and soft skills needed
Requirement managers generally have certain specific skills, knowledge, and abilities. They usually have an above-average intellectual capacity, abstract-logical, mathematical thinking skills, and cognitive memory. Spatial imagination is another great skill to have.
Heavy focus is on the ability to organize and plan as well as good communication skills.
Further soft skills include decision-making ability, speed of action, and the ability to work independently. Since a requirements manager must coordinate with several people and/or departments within process cycles, leadership ability, flexibility, mental resilience as well as willingness to learn should also be prioritized.
What skills should a requirements manager have?
- Abstract-logical way of thinking
- Organizational ability
- Decisiveness
- Leadership ability
- Knowledge of requirement management tools (e.g. DOORS / Polarion)
Looking for a new job?
Background: Education and Certifications
As a rule, the prerequisite for a job in requirements management is a degree in computer science, business informatics, or any engineering degree. However, it may also be sufficient to be highly trained as an IT specialist plus appropriate further certification, such as the IREB Requirements Manager certification.
Salary
The salary range is around $56,000 for beginners and $148,000 for senior managers. The average annual salary is around $108,000. In addition, the salary increases with increasing practical expertise and experience. In addition to these more personal factors, the size of the company, the sector, and, last but not least, the region or company headquarters or size also plays a dominant role.
How much does a requirements manager earn?
| Junior | $56,000 |
| Average | $108,000 |
| Senior | 148,000 |
And, how much do Freelancers charge in the Requirements management field?
Requirements Managers on freelancermap charge on average:
Rates in this field range between $33 and $106/hour for most freelancers.
The daily rate for Requirements Managers (8 working hours) would be around:
