Roger Cauvin Principal Product Management Consultant at Cauvin Inc.

We are in the midst of a requirements crisis. Some companies are producing multiple requirements documents (MRDs, PRDs, and SRSes) but still neglecting key nonfunctional requirements. The line between requirements and design remains elusive to many product managers, inhibiting innovation. Developers code to specs but lose sight of the problems that customers want solved.

Part of this crisis stems from confusion over requirements terminology and concepts. What, precisely, is a requirement? What is the difference between a functional requirement and a nonfunctional requirement? How can we differentiate requirements from design? Roger will answer these and other questions with the help of a conceptual model of requirements terminology.

BIO: Roger has six years experience in strategic marketing, most recently as the principal product management consultant at Cauvin, Inc. His clients have ranged from software development companies to real estate developers. In addition to determining the positioning and messaging for products, one of Roger's primary duties is to understand and document requirements in terms of the problems a product should solve.

Roger writes his thoughts on product management in his blog (cauvin.blogspot.com), and he is the author of two popular articles that appeared in the on-line marketing periodical, MarketingProfs.com. He began his professional career as a software engineer in 1990, holding leadership positions at several companies before developing an interest in requirements and the strategic aspects of marketing.

Roger is an Austinite and lives in the heart of downtown. He received his undergraduate degree in Philosophy, along with a minor in Computer Science, from the University of Texas in 1990.