TOPIC: Process Plan Scope Management and its output

Hi,

when studying the outputs of the 'Plan Scope Management' process, I do not understand the difference of Requirement Management Plan and Scope Management Plan, correctly. I would have assumed that the requirements are part of the scope.
Google suggested that requirments are for the whole project and scope for the phases, or requirements are somehow alls orts of requirments and scope is more functional.

Could someone help me understand the difference of requirements and scope?

Thanks a lot
Jessica

Hello Jessica,

I can see how this could be confusing. Yes, I would say that requirements are part of the scope. Indeed, both the Scope Management Plan and the Requirements Management plan are outputs of the Plan Scope Management process! I suggest that reviewing the respective paragraphs in the PMBOK might be helpful here (5.1.3.1 for Scope Management Plan, and 5.1.3.2 for Requirements Mangement Plan -- PMBOK Guide 5th Edition).

The Scope Management plan covers things like how you are going to develop a project scope statement, developing and maintaining your WBS, how you will get your customer to formally approve deliverables, and how you will deal with change reqests to the scope statement.

The Requirements Management Plan deals more specifically with requirements -- how are you going to collect them, how you will prioritize them, how you will trace them, etc.

So while the two are intimately related, perhaps it is best just to think of it this way: the requirements are so important we dedicate an entire plan to covering them!

I hope this helps.

Jessica, you may have already sorted it out already from Steve's reply. I'd like to add how you can think of Scope Management as the process you're in charge of as you go through the project, whereas the the Requirements are a customer driven process. You can control the rate of your work to complete the project by defining scope and managing changes to it. This becomes crucial, particularly as the voice of customer often asks for more things, which they are entitled to as the paying customer or boss, but as long as it fits into the agreed upon scope. If the requirements create variation for you from the scope, you will have to monitor and control. Any changes need to be adjudicated and compensated with money, time, or other material necessary to complete the project.