ABSTRACT
Generating, representing, negotiating and employing user requirements and ergonomics/human factors (E/HF) requirements is a hot topic. It is difficult to overstate the vital role that user E/HF requirements play in systems development. To ignore them, misunderstand them or identify them carelessly invites potential for systems failure and wasted resources of time, people and costs. For example the UK FIREControl IT project was flawed from the outset because it “. . . did not have the support of the majority of those essential to its success – its users [p. 5] . . . there was no single, authoritative owner of the user requirements . . .” [p. 6] (National Audit Office, 2011). Other “spectacular” failures highlight the importance of requirements capture, the leading reason for failures being that “project teams did not know how adequately to generate user information requirements” (Lindgaard et al, 2006, p. 50).
