Objectives

An objective is a specific goal or outcome of a project. There are many great resources and tools to help PMs and BAs develop outstanding project objectives. Spending time clarifying these objectives with the business stakeholders is a valuable task. Objectives should be SMART—Specific, Measurable, Agreed upon, Realistic, and Time-framed.

Having written, clear, accurate objectives is important because they define the success criteria of a project. They also give the project team clear direction for project work. Project objectives, once approved by the sponsor, should be shared with everyone on the project team and reviewed frequently throughout the life of the project. This is a great resource for the BA if he or she starts to experience “analysis paralysis” (see Chapter 7) or gets overwhelmed by the work of eliciting, organizing, and analyzing requirements. Take a few moments to reread the project initiation documentation and focus on the objectives. Remind yourself why the project was started and what goals are to be accomplished. Taking a step back from the details (seeing the forest, not the trees) is an excellent way for a BA to regain perspective and to refocus his or her efforts on the most important requirements work.

Problems/Opportunities

As discussed earlier in this chapter, projects are typically initiated in response to a business problem or opportunity. At the beginning of a project, the business stakeholders often state a number of things that they want from the project (opportunities) or problems that they have. In many organizations, these are referred to as the high-level business requirements, but these items are not necessary requirements yet. They are raw and unrefined. They have not been analyzed or approved. These problems and/or opportunities should be clearly stated and included with the project initiation material. This is a place to give more details than in the statement of purpose about why the project work is important and how it will benefit the organization.

Table 3.4 lists some sample problems and opportunities. Note that every problem does not necessarily lead to an opportunity and every opportunity is not identified as a result of a problem.

Table 3.4: Examples of Problems and Opportunities
Problem	Opportunity
	Our competitors have Web sites to sell their office supplies online. We need to compete in this area.
We get many calls about store locations, product prices and availability, and order status.
Our delivery department is not being utilized to full capacity.	Deliveries of both Web orders and phone orders could be combined.

Stakeholders

As discussed in Chapter 2, identifying and understanding project stakeholders is a fundamental task of the PM and BA. The list of stakeholders should be included in the project initiation documentation. An important component of scoping the project is knowing who will be involved and how many individuals will be participating.