Design Requirements
Establishing Requirements
Design requirements list specific criteria that a new product or service must meet in order to be considered successful.
It is essential to establish these requirements up-front, so they can be used to help your team design, develop, and evaluate your solution.
There are different types of design requirements. Three key types of requirements are:
Functional Requirements
Usability Requirements
User Experience (UX) Requirements
Functional requirements specify the functions and features that the solution should have to be useful to the target users. Functional requirements generally focus on making sure the product:
has the necessary functions to allow users to complete tasks and achieve their goals
has innovative features that provide additional value to users
Usability requirements specify criteria to ensure the solution is easy to use. Usability requirements generally focus on making sure the product:
is easy to learn and remember
is efficient and effective to use
helps prevent and fix user errors
User experience (UX) requirements specify criteria to ensure the solution is satisfying and enjoyable to use. UX requirements generally focus on making sure the product:
produces desirable reactions (such as users feeling confident, engaged, relaxed, happy, etc.)
avoids undesirable reactions (such as users feeling frustrated, bored, annoyed, angry, etc.)
In addition, other types of design requirements for a solution might include:
Data Requirements (criteria for data that the solution must gather, process, and store)
Operational and Environmental Requirements (criteria for the physical, social, and/or technical conditions that the solution must operate within)
Security and Privacy Requirements (criteria for how the solution must protect itself and its data from misuse, attacks, or breaches)
Legal and Regulatory Requirements (criteria that ensure the solution adheres to any relevant laws or regulations)
Maintenance and Support Requirements (criteria for how solution will be maintained and supported in the future)
etc.
Measuring Requirements
An important aspect of any design requirement is the ability to objectively determine or measure whether the requirement was met (or to what degree it was met). A vague requirement will be less helpful when designing, building, and evaluating a product – so make each requirement as clear and specific as possible.
After a solution has been designed and built, data from evaluations (such as usability testing, etc.) can provide evidence of how well the design requirements were met.
Last updated
