A framework for prioritization of system requirements in system development projects
Prioritizing system requirements is an important issue for utilizing resources in system development departments. Issues arise when the number of requirements to prioritize are more than there are resources available in the system development department. Thus, the system requirements that a company want carried out by the system development department must prioritized in a structured way. To make prioritization structured, support is required in the form of regulations, framework and methods for prioritizations. Today there are no frameworks that provide this support. This study explores which components a framework should consist of to support the prioritization of system requirements. The aim is to create a framework for implementing structured decision support with prioritization methods. A well designed research strategy containing three different research phases is used: exploration, design and evaluation. The research phases guide the work in the right direction and aim to counteract validity threats that may occur. The research method is of a qualitative and inductive nature. Facts are obtained through literature studies, interviews and preliminary studies, which were analyzed from which a first version of the framework's components is designed. Evaluation interviews are conducted with respondents who have many years of experience of prioritization in system development. The evaluation show that companies, regardless of industry, have similar conditions and structures to apply the framework. The first version of the framework is validated as relevant, appropriate and functional for prioritizing system requirements with minor adjustments. Following an analysis of the evaluation, a final version of the framework for prioritization of requirements in system development projects, called PaKS, was created. The outcome of the evaluation shows that PaKS is useful in its overall design, in which respondents contributed proposals for further design.
