22 Business Analysis: Requirements & Evaluation Practice Questions & Answers

Every Business Analysis: Requirements & Evaluation practice question from the CAPM Practice Test, with the correct answer and a short explanation.

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1. A team member finishes several elicitation sessions and writes up the notes. What should happen to those results before the requirements are analyzed further?
- A.The results should be sent to the sponsor for funding approval first.
- B.The results should be confirmed with the stakeholders who gave them.✓ Answer
- C.The results should be baselined immediately as approved requirements.
- D.The results should be converted into test cases before any review.
Elicitation is an active, three-step activity: prepare for the session, conduct it, and then confirm the captured results with the people who supplied them. Confirmation catches misheard or misinterpreted statements while correction is still cheap; approval, baselining and test design all come later and would otherwise be built on unverified notes.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirements elicitationReport a problem with this question
2. Input is needed from several hundred users spread across many locations, and the team wants comparable, quantifiable answers quickly. Which elicitation technique fits best?
- A.A structured questionnaire distributed to all of the users✓ Answer
- B.A shadowing session observing each user at their desk
- C.A facilitated workshop with all of the users in one room
- D.A one-on-one interview with each of the users involved
A survey or questionnaire is the technique built for large, geographically dispersed populations: it collects the same structured questions from everyone at low cost and produces data that can be counted and compared. Interviews, workshops and observation all require the analyst's time per participant, so they do not scale to hundreds of respondents in many locations.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — elicitation techniquesReport a problem with this question
3. Warehouse staff say they "just know" how to handle exceptions and cannot describe the steps they take. Which approach will best capture the actual as-is process?
- A.Reviewing the warehouse's published procedure manual
- B.Observing the staff directly while they handle real cases✓ Answer
- C.Holding a brainstorming session with the warehouse managers
- D.Sending the staff a checklist so they record their own steps
Observation, also called job shadowing, is chosen precisely when people perform work skilfully but cannot articulate it, because watching the work reveals steps, workarounds and exceptions that self-reporting leaves out. A manual documents the intended process rather than the real one, and self-recorded checklists or a managers' discussion repeat the same gap between what people say and what they do.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — elicitation techniquesReport a problem with this question
4. Two departments have submitted requirements that contradict each other, and weeks of email exchanges have not resolved it. What is the most effective way to reach agreement?
- A.Document both requirements and defer the conflict to testing
- B.Ask the sponsor to choose one department's requirements
- C.Run a facilitated workshop with both departments present✓ Answer
- D.Survey both departments and adopt the majority answer
A facilitated workshop brings the conflicting parties into the same interactive session with a neutral facilitator, so trade-offs are debated and a shared decision is reached in one sitting instead of through slow one-way exchanges. Escalating to the sponsor, counting votes or postponing the clash all leave the underlying disagreement unexamined and push rework later, when it costs more.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — elicitation techniquesReport a problem with this question
5. Before meeting stakeholders, a team member studies existing contracts, regulations and legacy system manuals to draw requirements out of them. Which elicitation technique is being used?
- A.Focus group discussion with experienced users
- B.Benchmarking against comparable organizations
- C.Prototyping of the proposed replacement system
- D.Document analysis of existing written material✓ Answer
Document analysis extracts requirements from material that already exists — contracts, policies, regulations, forms and system documentation — which makes it the efficient first pass before stakeholder time is spent. Benchmarking compares practices with other organizations, prototyping produces something to react to, and a focus group gathers opinions live, so none of them describe reading existing records.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — elicitation techniquesReport a problem with this question
6. Stakeholders keep saying the new screen should "feel simpler" but cannot specify what they want. Which technique gives them something tangible to react to early?
- A.Building a wireframe or clickable prototype for review✓ Answer
- B.Writing a detailed textual specification for approval
- C.Recording the requirement as stated and refining it later
- D.Circulating a questionnaire about screen preferences
Prototyping — wireframes, mock-ups or clickable models — turns a vague preference into something stakeholders can see and criticize, and their reactions progressively elaborate the requirement into testable statements. Written specifications and questionnaires still depend on the words stakeholders cannot find, and recording the vague wording simply carries the ambiguity into build and test.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — elicitation techniquesReport a problem with this question
7. A moderator leads a pre-qualified group of eight customers through a guided discussion to learn their attitudes toward a proposed feature. Which technique is this?
- A.The Delphi technique, which builds expert consensus over rounds
- B.Nominal group technique, which ranks ideas by anonymous voting
- C.Brainstorming, which generates many ideas without evaluating them
- D.A focus group, which draws out attitudes in a guided discussion✓ Answer
A focus group is defined by its shape: a moderator, a deliberately pre-qualified set of participants, and an interactive discussion aimed at attitudes and expectations rather than a list of ideas or a ranked result. Brainstorming defers evaluation, nominal group technique adds voting to rank options, and Delphi keeps experts anonymous across successive rounds.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — elicitation techniquesReport a problem with this question
8. A requirement states that the system must return search results fast enough to keep the checkout page responsive under peak load. How is this requirement classified?
- A.As a functional requirement, describing an action the system performs
- B.As a business requirement, stating the goal the organization pursues
- C.As a transition requirement, covering only the move to the new system
- D.As a non-functional requirement, describing a required quality of service✓ Answer
Non-functional requirements, also called quality-of-service requirements, constrain how well the solution must behave — performance, security, availability, usability — rather than what it must do. The functional requirement here would be "the system returns search results"; the speed under load is a quality attached to that behaviour, and it must still be written so it can be measured and tested.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirement typesReport a problem with this question
9. A plan includes converting historical records into the new system's format and training staff before go-live. These items are examples of which requirement type?
- A.Quality requirements, since they set the criteria for acceptance
- B.Transition requirements, since they apply only at changeover✓ Answer
- C.Business requirements, since they explain why the change is needed
- D.Solution requirements, since they define what the product must do
Transition requirements are temporary capabilities needed to move from the current state to the future state — data conversion, training, cutover activities and decommissioning — and they stop applying once the changeover is complete. Solution requirements persist in the delivered product, which is the distinction being tested, and these items also gate go-live because readiness depends on them.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirement typesReport a problem with this question
10. "The organization must cut order-processing cost" and "the warehouse supervisor needs a daily exception report" appear in the same document. How do these two statements differ?
- A.The first is a business requirement; the second is a stakeholder requirement✓ Answer
- B.The first is a solution requirement; the second is a quality requirement
- C.The first is a stakeholder requirement; the second is a business requirement
- D.The first is a transition requirement; the second is a solution requirement
Business requirements state the higher-level need or goal of the whole organization and answer why the work is being undertaken, while stakeholder requirements state what a particular group or role needs in order to do its job. Keeping the levels separate matters because each stakeholder requirement should trace upward to the business need that justifies it.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — levels of requirementsReport a problem with this question
11. A requirement reads: "The reporting screen shall be user-friendly." Which characteristic of a well-written requirement does this statement most clearly fail?
- A.It is not complete, because the screen's data fields are not listed
- B.It is not traceable, because no source or business need is recorded
- C.It is not feasible, because no technology could deliver such a screen
- D.It is not verifiable, because no objective test can prove it is met✓ Answer
A well-written requirement must be unambiguous and verifiable, meaning an objective test can show whether it has been met. "User-friendly" is a subjective judgement that two reviewers can score differently, so no acceptance test can settle it; the fix is to restate it as an observable, measurable condition such as the task a user must be able to complete unaided.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — characteristics of well-written requirementsReport a problem with this question
12. A team needs to show every condition an insurance claim can be in — submitted, under review, approved, paid, closed — and the events that move it between them. Which model fits?
- A.A state diagram, showing conditions and permitted transitions✓ Answer
- B.A wireframe, showing the layout of the screen the user sees
- C.A context diagram, showing the boundary and external entities
- D.A data model, showing entities and the relationships among them
A state diagram is the model whose whole purpose is to enumerate the conditions an object can occupy and the events or rules that allow movement from one to the next, which is exactly the information described. A context diagram frames scope, a data model shows entities and relationships, and a wireframe shows screen layout, so none of them capture allowed transitions.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirements modelsReport a problem with this question
13. A team wants one picture of what sits inside the solution's scope and which external systems and actors exchange information with it. Which artifact serves that purpose?
- A.A story map, arranging backlog items along the user's journey
- B.A context diagram, framing the scope and its outside interfaces✓ Answer
- C.A process flow, ordering the steps and decisions inside the process
- D.A use case, describing an actor's goal and the flow of events
A context diagram draws a single boundary around the solution and shows only the external entities, systems and actors that exchange information across that boundary, which makes scope inclusions and exclusions visible at a glance. Process flows, use cases and story maps all describe behaviour or sequencing inside the boundary rather than the boundary itself.
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14. An analyst must document a claim submission in detail: the actor, the preconditions, the main flow of steps, and the alternate and exception flows. Which artifact is built for that content?
- A.A persona, a profile representing a typical class of user
- B.A use case, a structured account of the actor's interaction✓ Answer
- C.A data flow diagram, a map of data moving among the processes
- D.A user story, a short placeholder for a conversation to come
A use case is structured precisely around actor, goal, preconditions, main flow and alternate or exception flows, so it is the artifact chosen when step-by-step interaction detail must be written down. A user story is deliberately brief and stands in for a later conversation, a persona characterizes a user type, and a data flow diagram traces data rather than dialogue with the system.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirements documentationReport a problem with this question
15. A team uses MoSCoW to prioritize a release. What does classifying an item as a "must have" mean?
- A.The item is the highest-value item and is scheduled first in the release
- B.The item is agreed as desirable but can be delivered in a later release
- C.The item is excluded from this release by agreement with the stakeholders
- D.The item is required for the release to be viable, so it cannot be dropped✓ Answer
In MoSCoW, "must have" marks an item without which the release has no viable value or cannot lawfully or safely operate, so it defines the non-negotiable core rather than the order of work. "Should have" and "could have" cover important and desirable items that can slip, and "won't have this time" records what stakeholders have agreed to leave out.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirements prioritizationReport a problem with this question
16. Two features carry equal business value, but one cannot be built until a shared data service exists. How should the ordering of work reflect this?
- A.The data service should be ordered before the dependent feature✓ Answer
- B.The two features should be split evenly across the coming releases
- C.The two features should be ordered strictly by their business value
- D.The data service should be built only after both features are done
Priority is set by value, but sequencing must also respect dependencies: an enabler that another item requires is scheduled ahead of the item that needs it, or the dependent work simply cannot start. Ordering by value alone, deferring the enabler, or spreading items evenly all leave a blocked item in a position where no team can complete it.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — requirements prioritizationReport a problem with this question
17. What does a requirements traceability matrix link a requirement to, and in which directions?
- A.It links each requirement forward to the stakeholder who approved it
- B.It links each requirement forward to the sprint in which it was written
- C.It links each requirement backward to the budget line that funds it
- D.It links each requirement backward to its origin and forward to tests✓ Answer
Traceability runs in two directions: backward from a requirement to the business need, objective or source that justifies it, and forward to the design, the deliverable that implements it and the test that verifies it. That two-way linkage is what makes coverage checks, change-impact analysis and detection of orphan requirements possible.
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18. During a readiness review before delivery, one approved requirement in the traceability matrix has no linked test result. What does this indicate?
- A.The product is not ready, because the matrix must be re-baselined
- B.The product is not ready, because that requirement remains unverified✓ Answer
- C.The product is ready, because the requirement was formally approved
- D.The product is ready, because the matrix is only a reporting tool
Readiness is judged by walking the traceability matrix and confirming that every approved requirement traces to a built, tested and accepted work product; a requirement with no linked test has unproven coverage and is a genuine gap. The correct response is to close the gap by testing the requirement, not to re-baseline the matrix or rely on the earlier approval, which said nothing about whether the work was done correctly.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — validating requirements through product deliveryReport a problem with this question
19. Requirements have been reviewed and approved as a baseline on a plan-driven project. A stakeholder now asks for one extra field on a form. What should happen next?
- A.The change should go through change control so its impact is assessed✓ Answer
- B.The change should wait until the project's closing phase to be logged
- C.The change should be refused because the baseline cannot ever change
- D.The change should be added by the developer since the effort is small
Once requirements are baselined, they change only through the approved change-control process, which assesses the impact on scope, schedule, cost, risk and traced test coverage before a decision is made. Slipping a change in directly is scope creep and breaks traceability, while refusing all change or deferring the request ignores that a baseline is meant to be changed in a controlled way, not frozen.
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20. A deliverable passes every internal quality check against its specification, yet the sponsor says it does not solve the business problem. Which statement describes what happened?
- A.Both verification and validation succeeded, since the specs were met
- B.Verification succeeded but validation failed, since the need is unmet✓ Answer
- C.Neither verification nor validation applies before formal acceptance
- D.Validation succeeded but verification failed, since defects remain
Verification asks whether the product was built right — whether it conforms to its specification — while validation asks whether the right product was built, that is, whether it meets the stakeholder need and earns formal acceptance. Conformance to a specification that captured the wrong need passes verification and still fails validation, which is why both checks are required.
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21. A team applies the same checklist — reviewed, tested, documented — to every backlog item, and separately writes conditions unique to each item. Which pairing is correct?
- A.The shared checklist is the definition of ready; the unique conditions are the definition of done
- B.The shared checklist is the acceptance criteria; the unique conditions are the definition of ready
- C.The shared checklist is the acceptance criteria; the unique conditions are the definition of done
- D.The shared checklist is the definition of done; the unique conditions are the acceptance criteria✓ Answer
The definition of done is a single quality standard the team applies to every backlog item, while acceptance criteria are the specific, testable conditions written for one item so that its behaviour can be checked and accepted. The definition of ready is a third, separate idea: it says an item is understood well enough to be pulled into an iteration.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — acceptance criteriaReport a problem with this question
22. Six months after release, measurements show the solution is widely used but the expected cost savings have not materialized. What should be done first?
- A.Close the project at once, since benefits are owned by operations
- B.Replace the solution at once, since the expected savings did not appear
- C.Compare the actual results with the business case measures to find the cause✓ Answer
- D.Restate the expected savings so the business case matches the results
Solution evaluation measures actual performance against the success measures set out in the business case, and the gap must be diagnosed before any decision is taken. Only after the cause is known can the organization sensibly choose among improving the solution, addressing adoption or process issues, replacing it or retiring it; rewriting the target or scrapping the solution first discards the evidence needed for that choice.
Source: PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline, business analysis frameworks — solution evaluationReport a problem with this question

Practice questions based on the PMI CAPM Examination Content Outline and standard project-management and business-analysis concepts. CAPM, PMP and PMBOK are marks of the Project Management Institute; this site is not affiliated with or endorsed by PMI. PMI sets and periodically revises the exam's length, scoring and eligibility requirements — read the current CAPM handbook and Exam Content Outline on PMI's site before you apply or test. About the CAPM exam →

1. A team member finishes several elicitation sessions and writes up the notes. What should happen to those results before the requirements are analyzed further?

2. Input is needed from several hundred users spread across many locations, and the team wants comparable, quantifiable answers quickly. Which elicitation technique fits best?

3. Warehouse staff say they "just know" how to handle exceptions and cannot describe the steps they take. Which approach will best capture the actual as-is process?

4. Two departments have submitted requirements that contradict each other, and weeks of email exchanges have not resolved it. What is the most effective way to reach agreement?

5. Before meeting stakeholders, a team member studies existing contracts, regulations and legacy system manuals to draw requirements out of them. Which elicitation technique is being used?

6. Stakeholders keep saying the new screen should "feel simpler" but cannot specify what they want. Which technique gives them something tangible to react to early?

7. A moderator leads a pre-qualified group of eight customers through a guided discussion to learn their attitudes toward a proposed feature. Which technique is this?

8. A requirement states that the system must return search results fast enough to keep the checkout page responsive under peak load. How is this requirement classified?

9. A plan includes converting historical records into the new system's format and training staff before go-live. These items are examples of which requirement type?

10. "The organization must cut order-processing cost" and "the warehouse supervisor needs a daily exception report" appear in the same document. How do these two statements differ?

11. A requirement reads: "The reporting screen shall be user-friendly." Which characteristic of a well-written requirement does this statement most clearly fail?

12. A team needs to show every condition an insurance claim can be in — submitted, under review, approved, paid, closed — and the events that move it between them. Which model fits?

13. A team wants one picture of what sits inside the solution's scope and which external systems and actors exchange information with it. Which artifact serves that purpose?

14. An analyst must document a claim submission in detail: the actor, the preconditions, the main flow of steps, and the alternate and exception flows. Which artifact is built for that content?

15. A team uses MoSCoW to prioritize a release. What does classifying an item as a "must have" mean?

16. Two features carry equal business value, but one cannot be built until a shared data service exists. How should the ordering of work reflect this?

17. What does a requirements traceability matrix link a requirement to, and in which directions?

18. During a readiness review before delivery, one approved requirement in the traceability matrix has no linked test result. What does this indicate?

19. Requirements have been reviewed and approved as a baseline on a plan-driven project. A stakeholder now asks for one extra field on a form. What should happen next?

20. A deliverable passes every internal quality check against its specification, yet the sponsor says it does not solve the business problem. Which statement describes what happened?

21. A team applies the same checklist — reviewed, tested, documented — to every backlog item, and separately writes conditions unique to each item. Which pairing is correct?

22. Six months after release, measurements show the solution is widely used but the expected cost savings have not materialized. What should be done first?