Requirements management (RqM) helped FAA Program Management Organization (PMO) programs deliver stakeholders’ needs on time and within budget. FAA’s Technical Management and Integration Team (AJM-132) collaborates with PMO programs and delivers requirements management governance and best practices, lifecycle support, and knowledge sharing. In October 2020, AJM-132 asked the U.S. DOT Volpe Center to provide subject matter expertise to complete their business plan goals related to RqM activities.

A team of U.S. DOT Volpe Center experts facilitated webinars on requirements management, configuration management, and risk management in May 2022; delivered a full-day RqM workshop, during which PMO programs learned about governance practices and how to use a prescribed template to develop a RqM Plan (RqMP); and conducted ongoing RqM health metrics to determine a program’s state and recommended improvement activities. The U.S. DOT Volpe Center held a follow-up RqM workshop in August 2022 and continued to support the AJM-132 team as they rolled out new configuration management tools across FAA in September 2022. The U.S. DOT Volpe Center’s expertise with RqM made the team uniquely qualified to contribute to the development of recommendations to improve compliance of requirements management for PMO programs.

A program self-assessment survey determined that 87 percent of PMO programs have a defined RqMP. The requirements health metrics activity developed a 5-level maturity indicator to identify program adherence to RqM governance, in which Levels 1-3 are in place and Levels 4-5 are future goals. This activity found that 13 percent of PMO programs are at Level 1 (program process not documented), 45 percent are at Level 2 (program has an approved process that is not in compliance with the latest governance), and 42 percent are at Level 3 (program has an approved process and follows the latest governance).

The RqM project provided PMO programs with the knowledge and tools to efficiently manage program requirements. Through its work developing workshops, reviewing RqMPs, and creating metrics, and with the U.S. DOT Volpe Center’s detail-oriented and results-driven approach in evaluating RqM plans and practices, PMO programs were better positioned to cost effectively meet stakeholders’ needs as defined and within scope.

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