I chose to research the topic “User Requirements Vs. Business Requirements” because of the field of work I am in – marketing. I struggle with putting myself in the audience’s shoes, so I’m hoping this research helps with that.
What is a “User Centered Design Concept?”
“Design is based upon an explicit understanding of users, tasks, and environments; is driven and refined by user-centered evaluation; and addresses the whole user experience. The process involves users throughout the design and development process and it is iterative.” Source: usability.gov.
In order to understand the user expereince, you need to first identify the people who will use the product and how they will use it. What goals must be met for the product to be successful? How do we get the product to satisfy the system? What will that process look like?
What are “User Requirements?”
Also known as user needs, user requirements are the stipulations that your product must meet in order to be successful and from the perspective of your audience.
To find out what your user needs are, you can create a persona, or user profile. Essentially, this creates a fictional person to help your team identify what needs or wants your potential audience may have regarding your product. By creating the profile, you can start to anticipate those and create solutions for them. You cannot meet with every end user, so creating these models to represent them connects your team to the end user.
To create a persona, they need an identity, status (primary, secondary, tercery user, etc.), languages spoken, goals (related to your product), their background and skill set, tasks (why they’re looking for your product), requirements (what your product needs to have in order to successfully meet their goals), expectations (will the product work how they’re anticipating it to?), and a photo of this user (to connect your team further to them). It is helpful to give your persona some sort of disability because when you design a product based around those, it can help everyone.
An additional step to take for creating a persona is to create a scenario, or use case. Basically, the persona is created and this is added for more details based on what the user requires of the product. You can easily identify issues that users can run into, and then begin problem-solving.
What are “Business Requirements?”
Business requirements are “resources or methods organizations require to reach their business goals.” Business goals can be identified through analysis and critical thinking. What challenges are you facing, and how can you solve them?
Sources
Requirements Gathering Checklists – Standford.edu
Isabella Susino 
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