Articles

Nuno Santos is currently a Senior Business Analyst at Natixis Portugal. He holds a PhD in Technologies and Information Systems, and is also certified from Agile Alliance as CSPO, and from the IIBA as CCBA, AAC and POA. He has also written articles about requirements, agility and product ownership at RE Magazine, BA Digest, Analyst Catalyst, Medium, and in several scientific conferences.

• Requirements Elicitation in Modern Product Discovery
• Inputs to requirements engineering in agile projects

Thorsten von Ramsch is Director Engineering at QAULITEST Group. He is an IREB Certified Requirements Engineer, ISTQB Certified Tester Full Advanced Level, ASQF Project Manager, Professional Scrum Master and iNTCCM Certified Professional for Configuration Management. His focus is on the banking and insurance sector, which he advises in the areas of requirements elicitation, test management and test analysis.

• Classical requirements and test analysis a discontinued model?

For more than twenty years, Rainer Grau has accompanied companies on their way enterprise agility. He supports companies in their efforts to continuously develop and create sustainable value for customers and employees. For him, it is particularly exciting to find out which methods, techniques and approaches are suitable for scaling agility and building the right product and the right service for the customer. Business analysis and requirements engineering are two essential disciplines in this context, which also generate high value in an agile setup - even if perhaps lived completely differently compared to a classic project approach.

Rainer's background of experience in business agility is based on his consulting work with companies from various industries. Stages of his professional life include Distinguished Consultant and Partner at Zühlke Engineering, Head of Business Development at digitec Galaxus, responsible for courses at universities of applied sciences on the topic of agility, founder of the Swiss Agile Leaders Circle, founder of Denkplan Verein and active involvement in communities around agility, business analysis and requirements engineering.

If there is still time left, Rainer Grau likes to spend it with his family, doing sports, playing his guitar and reading novels.

• Mission Possible
• Innovation Arena

Gil Regev has been a researcher at EPFL since 1997 in the fields of enterprise information systems, requirements engineering, change management and knowledge management. Since 2008 he is also manager and consultant at Itecor, a boutique consultancy firm. Previously Gil developed software for computer peripherals at Logitech, in Switzerland and California.

• A General Systems Thinking Perspective on the CPRE

Alain Wegmann is a full professor at the School of Computer and Communication Sciences, EPFL, Switzerland. He worked 14 years for Logitech (Switzerland, Taiwan, US) in positions ranging from software developer, IS manager, manufacturing engineering to VP of engineering and OEM marketing before joining the EPFL in 1997. His teaching, consulting and research are in the fields of enterprise architecture, requirements engineering and service engineering.

• A General Systems Thinking Perspective on the CPRE

Olivier Hayard has been a consultant and in charge of IT and Knowledge Management at Itecor, a boutique consultancy firm, since 1993. Olivier’s main interests are business analysis and requirements management, as practitioner, trainer and researcher.

• A General Systems Thinking Perspective on the CPRE

Project manager since 2008, certified Scrum Product Owner, Agile Project Manager, with foundations of PRINCE2. Over six years of experience as a UX designer and researcher. Worked in digital agencies as a digital project manager, then switched to the client's side. Head of Product in iTaxi, then in Pergamin (e-signature). Worked also for libraries and museums in Poland to help improve the accessibility of digital products.

Awarded by Innovation Ad Award for the prototype for Sensodyne and by nomination in Mobile Trends for the mobile app for drivers. An author of articles about product management, user experience, and accessibility.

• The Potential of User Tests for Requirements Engineering

Freelance trainer and consultant in Software Engineering. 20 years of work experience, including 7 years as consultant and project manager, 10 years in research and university teaching, and two guest professorships. Associate member at IREB, co-author of syllabus and handbook for the CPRE Advanced Level in Requirements Management. www.herrmann-ehrlich.de

• Requirements Engineering in Job Offers

Maya Daneva, PhD, is Senior Member of Scientific Staff in the Services and Cybersecurity group at the University of Twente, the Netherlands. Her research interests are requirements engineering for large systems, security requirements engineering, requirements-based project estimation, user feedback analytics, and empirical research methods. Maya has a strong international exposure having spent two years of her career in Germany at the University of Saarbruecken and in the IDS Scheer, and 9 years as a business process analyst for SAP Enterprise Recourse Planning projects at TELUS Corporation, Canada’s second largest telecommunication company.

• Requirements Engineering in Job Offers

Chong Wang is an assistant professor at Wuhan University. She has over 10 years of work experience in research and university teaching. Her research interests include requirements engineering, software engineering, and service computing.

• Requirements Engineering in Job Offers

Nelly Condori-Fernandez is an assistant professor at the Universidade da Coruna (Spain) and research associate of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (The Netherlands). Her research focuses on topics related to quality requirements prioritization and sustainability. She has published 85 articles in indexed journals and ranked conferences. Besides, she has been involved in several European projects.

• Requirements Engineering in Job Offers

Rana Siadati is currently a PhD student in Software Requirements Engineering and also a visiting lecturer by the School of Computer Science at the University of Hertfordshire. Alongside these roles, Rana has many years of academic and industrial experience, also at managerial level, gained in the UK and abroad.

• Learning from history: The case of Software Requirements Engineering

Paul Wernick is a Senior Lecturer in Computer Science at the University of Hertfordshire. Dr Wernick has taken leading roles in the ProSim series of software process simulation workshops, and the IEEE Workshop on Software Evolvability. Dr Wernick’s current research interests cover the high-level human environment within which software processes occur and their simulation, and computer security.

• Learning from history: The case of Software Requirements Engineering

Vito Veneziano is a Senior Lecturer in Computer Science at the University of Hertfordshire, and his interests range from software engineering, HCI, requirements analysis and system modelling, to how software systems impact on organisations. Previously Dr Veneziano worked in IT and project management, business application development, software design and consultancy.

• Learning from history: The case of Software Requirements Engineering

Jason Hansen obtained a BS in Chemical Engineering from Michigan Tech. He left the work force in 2005 to focus on raising an adopted special needs daughter. In 2015, he decided to return to school and obtained his AAAS in Network Admin. He is working as a tutor at GRCC while pursuing a Master’s Degree in Computer Software Engineering at GVSU.

• Challenges in the elicitation and determination of precise requirements from animal stakeholders

Hans van Loenhoud MSc is a consultant and teacher at Taraxacum in the Netherlands. He has been working in software development for more than 35 years, starting as a Cobol programmer and later on specialized in test and quality management.
In this role, he has been teaching various ISTQB test courses and has been chair of TestNet, the Dutch association of professional software testers. In recent years, he joined IREB to build a bridge between software testing and requirements engineering. He gives various Business Analysis, Requirements Engineering and Software Testing trainings. Hans is also a lecturer at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences for these topics and participates in the IREB advanced level Elicitation working group.

• On the right track
• The goal is to solve the problem
• Translating Exam Questions

Thijmen works as IT architect at Kommuninvest acting as technical lead for its digitalization initiative and growing CI/CD and Agile practice in the company. His work on the mini-QAW started in his role as researcher at ABB, where he worked on software architectures with colleagues around the globe. He authored publications at leading international software conferences, receiving two best paper awards. Thijmen graduated cum-laude in software engineering from VU University in the Netherlands and Malardalen University in Sweden.

• Discover Quality Requirements with the Mini-QAW

Michael Keeling is a software engineer at LendingHome and the author of Design It! From Programmer to Software Architect. In his career so far, he has worked on a variety of interesting software systems including IBM Watson, enterprise search applications, financial platforms, and Navy combat systems. Michael has a master’s degree in software engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and a bachelor’s degree in computer science from the College of William and Mary. Contact him via Twitter @michaelkeeling or his website, https://www.neverletdown.net

• Discover Quality Requirements with the Mini-QAW

Will Chaparro is a software development manager in IBM’s Watson Group. He spent over 5 years designing and building complex enterprise search solutions as a managing consultant. Prior to IBM he spent 11 years as a software engineer. He has a BS in Computer Science from the University of Pittsburgh.

• Discover Quality Requirements with the Mini-QAW

Inge Kress is a specialist in psychosomatic medicine. Currently she works at the University Hospital of Erlangen/Germany. Her research and clinical work focuses on stress and emotion processing. Besides practicing medicine, she engages in medical education regarding psychosomatic issues, giving scientific lectures and workshops. Her main objective is to learn and teach about cognitive, emotional and physiological processes and their impact on mental and physical health, especially in work life.

• To Brainstorm or Not to Brainstorm

As a Requirements Engineering Consultant and Trainer with SOPHIST GmbH, Anja Schwarz supports clients of different fields in all requirements engineering aspects. As a trainer, she prepares her participants for the CPRE Foundation Level certification as well as for the CPRE Advanced Level Elicitation & Consolidation certification. She also supports the IREB e.V. as Lead of the Elicitation and Consolidation working group. The elicitation of innovative requirements and thus the requirements for creativity have always fascinated her, leading to the cooperation with Inge Kress. Together, they brought the neurological aspects of creativity into the context of requirements engineering, also resulting in this article.


• To Brainstorm or Not to Brainstorm

Guilherme Siqueira Simões works on FATTO Software Consulting (www.fattocs.com). He is author of a book on Function Points and of another book on Requirements Engineering, and has trained thousands of people from Latin America on these subjects. He has more than 20 years of experience on software projects. He is graduated on computer science and business management. He is a certified professional on function points by IFPUG and COSMIC, requirements engineering by IREB and PMP by PMI.

• Functional Requirements and their levels of granularity

He has been a function point analysis user since 1991, instructor since 1993, certified function points specialists (CFPS) by IFPUG since 1996 and by COSMIC since 2012. In both certifications, was among the first Brazilians to hold them. In 2001, co-authored the book “APF: Medição, Estimativas e Gerenciamento de Projetos de Software”, currently in its 13th edition, with over 13,000 copies sold and the main reference book on the subject in Brazil. In 2016 coauthored the book "RE: Software Orientado ao Negocio” and became a certified professional for requirements engineering – foundation level – by the IREB.

• Functional Requirements and their levels of granularity

Manon Penning has a broad background in the fields of IT and education. She is an educational specialist, requirements engineer, quality analyst and trainer currently employed by Improve Quality Services, a provider of consultancy and training. Via Improve Quality Services she has been working for several Dutch companies over the past few years.

• Biased Toddlers
• The Genius Toddler Challenge

Albert Tort is the Research&Innovation Solutions Lead in Sogeti Spain. During the last years, he has been working as Quality Assurance and Software Control & Testing specialist in several projects for customers in different sectors (banking, airlines, insurance, procurement, etc.). Furthermore, he has been the lead of research&innovation projects developed at Sogeti. He was the winner of the “Capgemini-Sogeti Testing Innovation Awards 2015” for the submission of the best individual entry "Recover: Reverse Modeling and Up-To-Date Evolution of Functional Requirements in Alignment with Tests. He is also a member of the SogetiLabs community.

Previously, he served as a professor and researcher at the Services and Information Systems Engineering Department of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya-Barcelona Tech. As a member of the Information Modeling and Processing (MPI) research group, he focused his research on conceptual modeling, software engineering methodologies, OMG standards, knowledge management, requirements engineering, service science, semantic web and software quality assurance. Currently, he is also the coordinator of the postgraduate degree in Software Quality Assurance of the School of Professional & Executive Development of the Technical University Of Catalunya (BarcelonaTech).

He obtained his Computer Science degree in 2008 and he received his M.Sc. in Computing in 2009. In 2012 he presented the PhD thesis “Testing and Test-Driven Development of Conceptual Schemas”. He is the author of several publications in software engineering journals and conferences.

• KCycle: Knowledge-Based & Agile Software Quality Assurance
• The Recover Approach

Karol Frühauf is co-founder of INFOGEM AG in Switzerland, since 1987 consulting in the field of software project and quality management (http://www.infogem.ch). He worked 12 years for BBC Brown Boveri & Cie and helped since 1987 many companies to improve their processes and products. He co-authored two books and is a frequent speaker, tutor and teacher in the field of software engineering. His main interests are test and quality management and requirements engineering.
He initiated and directs the "Bridge Guard Art / Science Residence Centre" in Štúrovo, Slovakia (http://www.bridgeguard.org).

• Sharing My Doubts on the Focus of Requirements
• Sharing My Doubts on Goals and Requirements
• Sharing My Doubts on Shall / Should / Will etc.
• Sharing My Doubts on Acceptance Criteria

After studying physics in Germany and New Zealand, Gunnar Harde worked as software engineer, later as IT consultant and project manager for IT and business consultancies and research institutes. Since 2007 he is responsible for the development of several IT systems of the Group Quality Assurance at Volkswagen and shapes the cooperation between IT and business department strategically and methodically. Harde is Certified Scrum Product Owner and expert in agile management.

• Managing the Invisible
• Agility and Obligation
• Agility and Obligation

Manon Penning has a broad background in the fields of IT and education. She is an educational specialist, requirements engineer, quality analyst and trainer currently employed by Improve Quality Services, a provider of consultancy and training. Via Improve Quality Services she has been working for several Dutch companies over the past few years.

• Biased Toddlers
• The Genius Toddler Challenge

SOPHIST-in-chief (formally: founder and executive partner of the SOPHIST GmbH), chief consultant, coach and trainer. Looking back over 25 years of professional experience, a lot has come up: a company, 6 books, 55 employees, countless articles and presentations and a whole lot of experience. My passion for project consultation might account for the fact that, until now, I do not “only” manage, but I am still directly involved in projects and close to customers.
 

• Stable? Fragile? Agile! Attractive but reasonable

Human capital is not merely a phrase we do not live, it is one of the most important goods we have. With regards to my function as a Project coordinator, my aspiration is to target the optimized commitment of the individualized abilities, strengths and talents of the SOPHISTs. In addition, I am permanently looking for new employees for the team, taking care of our trainees, development of the staff and thus I am constantly supporting our executives. I benefit from my studies of Social Sciences, my multi-year experience in Human Resources and my sense for the positive.

• Stable? Fragile? Agile! Attractive but reasonable

Martin Tate is an IT consultant who has now personally run or rescued 52 projects to select off-the-shelf solutions, interviewed over 725 people to capture the requirements for selections and appraised over 1,000 candidate solutions. A ‘poacher turned gamekeeper’, he formerly worked for an IT provider and was trained to sell software. BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, made him a Chartered Fellow for eminence in evaluating software and recently published his book, a practitioner guide to procuring off-the-shelf IT.

• IT Requirements when Buying, not Making

Christoph Wolf works for more than 15 years as Requirements Engineer, Business Analyst, Project Manager and Quality Assurance Manager. He has built up a Business Analysis team and led it for several years. Since last year, he is consultant at SwissQ and supports clients in requirements engineering and quality assurance with focus on delivering business value. 

• The Business Analysis Center of Excellence

Stefan Meier is passionate about exploring and experimenting with new Requirements Engineering practices and methodologies. He many years of practical experience as Project Manager, Requirements Engineer  and Agile Coach. He loves talking to different stakeholders and sharpening their ideas and visions to get a crisp and clear understanding of their needs and values. 
He works at SPF Consulting and currently helps customers switching their requirements frameworks from waterfall processes towards agile approaches like Scrum. Additionally he is an conversant trainer for IREB CPRE FL, Visual Facilitation and Agile Requirements.

• Applying IREB RE practices in an agile environment

Albert Tort is the Research&Innovation Solutions Lead in Sogeti Spain. During the last years, he has been working as Quality Assurance and Software Control & Testing specialist in several projects for customers in different sectors (banking, airlines, insurance, procurement, etc.). Furthermore, he has been the lead of research&innovation projects developed at Sogeti. He was the winner of the “Capgemini-Sogeti Testing Innovation Awards 2015” for the submission of the best individual entry "Recover: Reverse Modeling and Up-To-Date Evolution of Functional Requirements in Alignment with Tests. He is also a member of the SogetiLabs community.

Previously, he served as a professor and researcher at the Services and Information Systems Engineering Department of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya-Barcelona Tech. As a member of the Information Modeling and Processing (MPI) research group, he focused his research on conceptual modeling, software engineering methodologies, OMG standards, knowledge management, requirements engineering, service science, semantic web and software quality assurance. Currently, he is also the coordinator of the postgraduate degree in Software Quality Assurance of the School of Professional & Executive Development of the Technical University Of Catalunya (BarcelonaTech).

He obtained his Computer Science degree in 2008 and he received his M.Sc. in Computing in 2009. In 2012 he presented the PhD thesis “Testing and Test-Driven Development of Conceptual Schemas”. He is the author of several publications in software engineering journals and conferences.

• KCycle: Knowledge-Based & Agile Software Quality Assurance
• The Recover Approach

Sven is senior consultant|trainer at inspearit|cibit academy. He has worked on aligning business and IT at various organisations for more than 20 years. Both at profit and non-profit organisations Sven has helped teams and individuals to reach improvements in processes and results. He masters and applies several methods and techniques. Sven has helped many persons to achieve more with the right use of requirements engineering techniques and with agile ideas and frameworks. He loves to share his experience with others.

• Requirements Engineering and Agile

Ina Paschen is a Senior Business Analyst and Project Manager at Zühlke Schweiz. As a practitioner and consultant she helps ensure her clients deliver successful projects: a clear project set-up, a solid requirements engineering process, clear requirements and business processes to be developed, an improved development process or a transparent communication between development and management to build trust, to reduce impediments, and therefore bridging worlds like agile and non-agile.

• Bridging communication gaps with a Feature Tree

Emmerich Fuchs has more than 30 years of experience in application development and is a consultant in business process modelling, requirements engineering and quality assurance. Since 1985 he has been teaching at technical colleges and universities of applied science, and is a well-known trainer, as well as a co-author and an examinant, as well as an active member of IREB.

• Bridging communication gaps with a Feature Tree

Ellen Gottesdiener is an internationally recognized leader in the convergence of agile + requirements + product management + project management. Ellen is founder and principal of EBG Consulting, which helps organizations adapt how they collaborate to improve business outcomes.

Ellen’s passion is helping people use modern product requirements practices to build valued products and great teams. She provides training, coaching, and facilitates discovery and planning workshops across diverse industries, including education, energy, financial services, pharmaceutical, software, transportation, and telecommunications.

Ellen is a world-renowned writer, speaker, and presenter. Her most recent book, co-authored with Mary Gorman, is Discover to Deliver: Agile Product Planning and Analysis. Ellen is author of two other acclaimed books: Requirements by Collaboration and The Software Requirements Memory Jogger.

You can connect digitally with Ellen via her Blog | Twitter | Newsletter | LinkedIn 

• Agile Product Ownership

Johan Zandhuis is Product manager at SYSQA BV, an organisation specialised in quality assurance in IT. The themes ‘creating value with IT’ and ‘getting grip on IT’ play a constant role when he’s doing the job. “Why are we doing this” is a question he likes to ask. Besides other publications Johan is co-author of the Dutch book ‘Grip op requirements’ based on the IREB syllabus. Also he is one of the initiators for the Dutch translation of the IREB-dictionary and the IREB foundation syllabus. Contact: jzandhuis@sysqa.nl

• Poor requirements?

Ulf Ackermann currently works as a Requirements Engineer in the B2B Industry Commerce division of T-Systems Multimedia Solutions GmbH. His degree in commercial information technology at the Dresden University of Applied Sciences helps him to capture customer requirements from both business and technical perspectives. He has more than 7 years’ experience in large scale E-Commerce projects and specializes in the area of project procedure models. He states: “Structuring a project from the few known variables to produce an appealing offering for the customer is the most challenging and in the end rewarding part of my daily work.”

• Customized Agile RE Process

Dirk Fritsch is a Principal Consultant in the requirements division at QA Systems GmbH.  He has over 10 years of experience in business analysis, process modelling and requirements engineering and has worked on customer projects from every sector. He collaborated in research projects at the University of Duisburg/Essen and the University of Leipzig, addressing recurring issues from customer projects to improve existing methods using new technologies and solutions. In his current work he focuses on training and coaching for requirements management using classical and agile methods.

• Customized Agile RE Process

Gareth is an experienced business analyst and product owner who has been working in the telecoms and other industries for longer than he’d like to be specific about. He has been an active member of IREB for some years and is a co-author and examiner within the RE@Agile working group. He lives and works in Germany having successfully escaped from a small, slightly uncooperative island.

• Splitting Requirements at Scale
• RE in Agile Projects: Survey Results
• RE in Agile Projects: a Survey
• How agile can Requirements Engineers really be?

Dr. Christof Ebert is managing director at Vector Consulting Services. He supports clients around the world to improve product strategy and product development and to manage organizational changes. A trusted advisor for companies around the world, member of industry boards, he lectures at the Universities of Stuttgart and at the Sorbonne in Paris. He authored several books including the popular “Systematic Requirements Engineering”. Contact him at christof.ebert@vector.com

• Cyber Security Requirements Engineering
• Product Management

Dr. Michael Jastram is an expert model-based systems engineering (MBSE), with a focus on requirements. He has over 20 years experience in software development and requirements engineering, which he regularly shares as author and public speaker. Amongst other things, he publishes weekly updates on Systems Engineering Trends [German] and monthly updates on Requirements Engineering [English].

Michael is a leader in open source requirements management, being project lead of the Eclipse Requirements Modeling Framework. He is also a strong advocate of open standard and actively contributes to the OMG Requirements Interchange Format (ReqIF).

Today, he is founder and principal systems engineer of Formal Mind GmbH, a service provider in Open Systems Engineering.

You can connect digitally with Michael via his Blog [en] | Blog [de] | Twitter | LinkedIn | Xing.

• What is a Useful Perspective in Considering Requirements Engineering Relative to Systems Engineering?
• Modeling Requirements with Constraints
• Open Up

Dr. Ralph R. Young (CSEP, http://www.ralphyoung.net) has invested his career in assisting individuals, projects, and organizations to improve and helping others to grow. He has a wide diversity of experience, including private sector, Federal Government, local government, military, and oversight of programs. He consults and speaks frequently concerning project management, requirements development and management, and process improvement. Ralph has written a series of five books to date: Effective Requirements Practices (that describes what to do); The Requirements Engineering Handbook (that describes how to perform requirements-related work); Project Requirements: A Guide to Best Practices (which is written for program and project managers, to communicate the importance and value of incorporating good requirements practices); Performance-Based Earned Value (with Paul Solomon), which proposes a change to industry earned value management practices; and How to Save a Failing Project: Chaos to Control (with Steve Brady and Dennis Nagle) that provides guidance and insight based on multiple efforts in changing the direction of failing projects and also for projects that desire to perform well.. Ralph contributed to another book, The 77 Sins of Project Management, written by a large number of contributors selected by the publisher, that describes sins, danger signs, suggested solutions, and tips for 77 aspects of project management – thoughtful, considered advice. Ralph enjoys the outdoors, boating, reading, writing, and family activities, especially six grandchildren. He wants to write another book, concerning leadership. He resides on Kent Island, Maryland USA. He welcomes comments and feedback and can be reached at ryoungrr@aol.com.

• Toward Better RE

Alexander Rachmann advises companies on the linking business and IT. His strong interdisciplinary knowledge of business administration and computer science enables him to work as an ideal Requirements Engineer, Business Analyst, or System Analyst. He has worked in industries such as e-commerce, healthcare, IT security, and software development. He holds a doctorate degree in economics, master's degrees in computer science and information science and a diploma in business computer science.

• Product Owner in Scrum

Jesko Schneider worked as a consultant with a focus on Business Analysis, Requirements Management and Usability Engineering. He built up consulting services for Requirements Engineering and Usability Engineering in an international consulting company. His industry focus lies on telecommunications. He is a well-known trainer for Certified Professional for Requirements Engineering from the IREB. In his role as Requirements Engineer, Business Analyst, System Analyst or Product Owner, he is always the linkage between business and IT. He holds a degree in media informatics.

• Product Owner in Scrum

Frank Engel looks back on over 10 years’ experience in project management and Requirements Engineering. Prior to his time as a Partner of the Anforderungsfabrik, he was responsible for an international consulting company as Unit Manager. Topic of his business unit was Requirements Engineering and Management. His role in projects is Product Owner, Project Manager and Requirements Engineer. He studied business information systems. Always linking business and IT!

• Product Owner in Scrum

Founder of the consulting company “Crescendo Technologies”, Joseph Aracic is a System Engineering Consultant, focusing on requirements management techniques and processes, product line engineering and model driven engineering.

Prior to this, Joseph has been the manager of the Telelogic (Now an IBM Rational brand) French Professional Services team for requirements management and architecture modeling. Joseph has been involved in various system engineering projects (mainly in the defense industry) as consultant/coach in system engineering techniques deployment.

• A key technique

Mats Wessberg holds a Masters degree in mathematics and computer science. He has been active in the IT community since the mid-nineties, initially as a software engineer but mainly as a consultant, often mentoring software projects in requirements engineering and methodology.

In 2006, he co-founded Inceptive, a Sweden based consulting firm specializing in software testing and requirements engineering, and was the company's CEO until 2013. He then founded Metrical, a company dedicated in helping software organizations boost their efficiency through process automation. Mats is currently CEO of Metrical.

• Think Like a Scientist

Erik van Veenendaal (www.erikvanveenendaal.nl) is a leading international consultant and trainer, and a widely recognized expert in the area of software testing and quality management.

He is the founder of Improve Quality Services BV (www.improveqs.nl). He holds the EuroSTAR record, winning the best tutorial award three times! In 2007 he received the European Testing Excellence Award for his contribution to the testing profession over the years. He has been working as a test manager and consultant in various domains for more than 20 years. He has written numerous papers and a number of books, including “Practical Risk-Based Testing: The PRISMA Approach” and “ISTQB Foundations of Software Testing”. He is one of the core developers of the TMap testing methodology and a participant in working parties of the International Requirements Engineering Board (IREB). Erik is also a former part-time senior lecturer at the Eindhoven University of Technology, vice-president of the International Software Testing Qualifications Board (2005–2009) and currently board member of the TMMi Foundation.

You can follow Erik on twitter via @ErikvVeenendaal.

• RE for Testers

For more than twenty years, Rainer Grau has accompanied companies on their way enterprise agility. He supports companies in their efforts to continuously develop and create sustainable value for customers and employees. For him, it is particularly exciting to find out which methods, techniques and approaches are suitable for scaling agility and building the right product and the right service for the customer. Business analysis and requirements engineering are two essential disciplines in this context, which also generate high value in an agile setup - even if perhaps lived completely differently compared to a classic project approach.

Rainer's background of experience in business agility is based on his consulting work with companies from various industries. Stages of his professional life include Distinguished Consultant and Partner at Zühlke Engineering, Head of Business Development at digitec Galaxus, responsible for courses at universities of applied sciences on the topic of agility, founder of the Swiss Agile Leaders Circle, founder of Denkplan Verein and active involvement in communities around agility, business analysis and requirements engineering.

If there is still time left, Rainer Grau likes to spend it with his family, doing sports, playing his guitar and reading novels.

• Mission Possible
• Innovation Arena

Howard Podeswa is a thought leader in the intersection of agile and business analysis. For over twenty years, he has been helping large organizations optimize their analysis and planning practices for agile software development approaches. He has authored a number of books that have become staple references for practitioners, most recently: The Agile Guide to Business Analysis and Planning: From Strategic Plan to Continuous Value Delivery - How Product Owners and Business Analysts (BAs) maximize the value of the product developed by the team, by integrating BA competencies with agile methodologies (Addison-Wesley Professional; 1st edition, 2021). Other works include UML for the IT Business Analyst (2009), and The Business Analyst’s Handbook (2008).

At Noble Inc., he has provided agile and business analysis services to clients worldwide, including the International Standards Organization (ISO), Moody’s, the Mayo Clinic, TELUS, TD Bank, LabCorp, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Mawer Investment Management Ltd., Bell Nexia, and REI Coop. He is currently advising IIBA on its Nimble initiative.

To contact Howard for in-house and public training and coaching services, please email howardpodeswa@nobleinc.ca or find him on LinkedIn @howardpodeswa

• Why Your Agile Organization Needs a High-Performing Requirements Engineering Competency
• The Business Case for Agile Business Analysis
• Five Questions