Generating Systems Requirements With Facilitated Group Techniques

Abstract

Ineffective systems requirements determination (SRD) has been a major problem in information systems delivery. Researchers have linked this problem to poor communication among systems designers and users. Several facilitated group techniques have been used to bring system developers, users, and managers together. These approaches have generally outperformed the traditional interviewing method. However, these group meetings are typically conducted with freely interacting group techniques (FIGT), which are prone to some of the classical relational problems and make successful outcomes critically reliant on excellent facilitation. The nominal group technique, which was designed to reduce the impact of negative group dynamics, is proposed as a crutch to help reduce the facilitator's burden of controlling relational problems during SRD. This approach, which was tested empirically in a laboratory experiment, appeared to outperform FIGT in the areas tested and seemed to contribute to excellent group outcomes even with less than excellent facilitation.