Traceability is usually perceived as something that slows down design, testing and certification.
Testers report that the process includes juggling too many tools, which means that there isn’t a central source of truth. On top of that, they hate how updating links between requirements, test cases and defects can feel like busywork instead of actual testing.
We understand that the constant need to manually maintain a requirements traceability matrix, whether inside a spreadsheet or a test management tool, can be frustrating. After all, one small change in requirements might need hours of rework, just to keep the documentation in sync.
However, all this can be avoided if you do things right. That said, let’s dissect what requirements traceability is. And how you’re supposed to carry it out so it doesn’t feel like you’re trying to push a boulder over an endless cliff.
Key Takeaways
- A requirements traceability matrix tracks requirements from the start. And it continues to do so till the testing and delivery, ensuring no gaps.
- It supports forward, backward, and bi-directional traceability for complete coverage.
- Creating a traceability matrix involves careful planning. If not done correctly, the whole process can come crashing down, and then you’ll definitely see “death by Excel.” So, you need to gather requirements and design proper test cases. You also have to build the matrix and maintain all the updates.
- Traceability matrices for requirements improve test coverage, risk management, communication and audit readiness.
- Excel spreadsheets are common for making requirements traceability matrices, but they often lead to challenges. These challenges can be solved using automated QA test management tools. With these tools, you won’t feel like requirements tracking is clerical or irrelevant again.
- Agile teams adapt matrices for requirements traceability to fit continuous development. All while balancing documentation with agility.
- Platforms like Kualitee integrate requirements matrix functions for better traceability. Along with reduced manual effort.
What is a Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM)?
To put it simply, the requirements traceability matrix is a document, typically a table. It’s used to track and ensure that all project requirements are covered in the development and testing process of a software project.
In a modern traceability matrix for requirements, all the requirements are linked to their corresponding test cases. It includes several other things as well. Such as code elements and defect records.
The document acts as a repository that establishes direct traceability. From the origin of each requirement to its implementation and verification. It allows project teams to verify that no requirement has been overlooked.
That said, there’s a specific tabular format for a requirements traceability matrix. It’s called the Requirements Traceability Matrix Format, which includes columns such as:
- Requirement ID and description.
- Requirement source and priority.
- Corresponding test case ID and description.
- Defect IDs linked to requirements if issues are found.
- Comments or notes about implementation or testing.
Who Needs a Requirements Traceability Matrix and What are Its Overall Benefits
- QA Managers and Test Leads: They can use RTMs to guarantee test completeness. Managing test execution status also becomes easier for them.
- Project Managers: People in this role can rely on an RTM’s traceability to control scope and track progress. Furthermore, an impact analysis of requirement changes can also be done.
- Developers: They can reference requirements linked to their coding tasks to understand the “why” behind features.
- Business Analysts and Product Owners: The Requirements traceability matrix helps them better verify that each requirement meets the business objectives. And that it receives proper validation.
- Compliance Officers and Auditors: These people can depend on the detailed traceability to confirm regulatory adherence and readiness.
- Customer Support Teams: With an RTM, these teams are able to access information to understand the software’s behavior and issues.
So what’s the general payoff of keeping an RTM? What are the advantages that everyone receives from it? Plenty. Here are the biggest wins:
- No Missed Functionality:
Since every requirement is mapped to a test case, the testers have a clear checklist, and users don’t end up with gap features.
- Bugs Caught Early:
Inconsistencies between requirements and features are spotted early during testing. Not after release. This means less firefighting and fewer costly fixtures.
- Smarter Change Management:
Requirements often shift, but with a traceability matrix, everybody quickly gets to know which tests and features are affected. Regression becomes more targeted. It’s not overwhelming anymore.
- Once Central Source of Truth:
Everybody from your team who has access to the requirements matrix sees the same validation status. The updates aren’t scattered. Hence, decisions move faster and collaboration feels more natural.
- Audit-ready Compliance:
Regulated industries need to conduct audits, whether internal or external. Requirements traceability matrices make the process smoother by linking the requirements to the testing evidence and defect fixes.
- Better Use of Resources:
Critical and high-risk requirements are highlighted in a requirements traceability matrix. This helps managers better decide where to spend time, budget and effort, along with what to prioritize.
Read More: Importance of Traceability in Software Testing
Types of Matrices for Requirements Traceability
There are multiple types of requirements traceability matrices. Each type handles requirements differently. The main difference between them is in the direction in which the user can track the requirements journey. Forward, backward, or in both directions.
Forward Traceability
A study by Farhan Ajmal Khan outlines that traceability between requirements and test cases is difficult and a time-consuming activity. The author has explained how we can improve forward and backward traceability of requirements between the system and model-based testing.
He discusses that traditionally, forward traceability starts from requirements and maps them forward. Either to the associated design elements, development tasks, test cases, or all of them. This approach is useful for you to:
- Plan test activities while ensuring all requirements receive good coverage.
- Assess the impacts of changing requirements on the development and testing.
- Track progress by verifying that tests and development artifacts exist for all requirements.
Considering this, you can say that forward traceability acts as a guide. It puts the project activities into place. From the initial specification through to the validation.
Backward Traceability
As the name suggests, backward traceability operates in reverse. It links your test cases, design components or deliverables back to their originating requirements.
This method works best in the following scenarios.
- When ensuring teams do not develop or test features beyond the defined scope. This is also known as avoiding scope creep.
- When validating that every deliverable aligns with an intended business objective.
- When providing evidence during audits to prove why specific features were implemented.
Furthermore, backward traceability can also help you detect unnecessary tests or redundant functions.
Bi-Directional Traceability
Westfall Team’s paper discusses what exactly traceability is, why it is a good practice and how it’s performed. It also mentions that bi-directional traceability combines both forward and backward approaches. It offers you a complete, closed-loop sort of tracking system.
Each requirement is linked to the corresponding tests. And every test maps back to a legitimate requirement.
The bi-directional traceability technique is most helpful when applied to complex projects. It can also work well for industries with strict regulatory demands. That’s because it:
- Provides real-time visibility into coverage gaps.
- Supports impact analysis when requirements change.
- Validates that no requirements or tests are extraneous.
It is worth mentioning that most high-maturity organizations adopt bi-directional traceability. They do it to maintain top quality and compliance standards.
How to Create a Requirements Traceability Matrix – The Right Way
We’ve had many QA testers ask us one question: “How does one come up with a good requirements traceability matrix?”
Let us answer it in detail.
You need a series of planned and deliberate steps to come up with a requirements traceability matrix that works. And they are as follows.
Step 1: Define Project Scope and Objectives
Project Management Institute’s article mentions that successful requirements traceability implementation correlates strongly with projects that have explicitly documented the goals of traceability upfront. Teams that defined RTM objectives early reported 30% fewer requirement-related defects.
So, before you start, it’s important to clarify the purposes of your traceability matrix. Ask yourself, what’s it looking to achieve? How do you want it to help?
This clarity sets the foundation for all the steps following this one. Defining objectives beforehand ensures the RTM remains relevant and focused. This way, information overload is avoided.
To exemplify this, take a highly regulated industry. Such as healthcare or aerospace. In these areas, compliance and audit readiness are most important. Hence, the traceability matrix for requirements must provide detailed and relevant traceability.
Step 2: Gather and Analyze Requirements
The next step is all about collecting all relevant project requirements from multiple sources. They can be business requirements documents (BRD), user stories from Agile backlogs, stakeholder interviews or just the regulatory frameworks.
Oh, and while collecting, do make sure that your project requirements are:
- Well-defined and Unambiguous: Clear and concise requirements reduce ambiguity, as one can expect. So, that means there’ll be no more gaps in testing or implementation. For example, “The app must support 100 concurrent users” will always be better than “The app should be fast.”
- Testable and Feasible: Each requirement should be verifiable through testing. So, try not to add fuzzy or subjective requirements as they are impossible to trace and confirm.
- Appropriately Prioritized: Prioritization guides test planning and resource allocation. After all, you would want the critical requirements to get quick validation, wouldn’t you?
- Assigned Requirement IDs: A report by the International Software Testing Qualifications Board (ISTQB) reveals that projects with standardized requirement IDs and thorough requirement analysis experience 25% faster defect resolution and 15% fewer scope creep issues. So, assign a unique identifier (e.g., “REQ-001”) to each requirement. It’ll be easier for you to reference and map them.
You can also use collaboration tools, like Jira and Confluence, for requirement gathering. This way, maintaining continuity and version control would be easier.
To help yourself out, use collaboration tools for requirement gathering. Jira and Confluence are two of them. You won’t have a hard time maintaining continuity and version control with these tools.
Step 3: Develop Test Cases
Assuming you have well-defined requirements on your hands, it’s time to craft test cases. They will verify that each requirement is met.
Do try to write test cases using a behavior-driven development (BDD) approach. Just so they closely reflect user expectations and requirements.
Also, each test case should directly correspond to a requirement. Complex requirements may even need multiple test scenarios. Ones that cover both positive and negative flows.
You can consider automating the test case generation where possible. There are many automation tools that integrate with RTM platforms. This will not only speed execution but also allow live updating of traceability in testing.
Step 4: Build the Traceability Matrix
Requirements are defined. Test cases are developed. You already know what’s next: Building a traceability matrix.
To do so, open a spreadsheet or a project management tool. One that aligns with the needs of your team. Once you’ve opened that, build a matrix inside it. This matrix will connect each requirement to the test cases, source and purpose.
Include the following columns in your spreadsheet matrix:
- Requirement ID
- Requirement Description
- Requirement Type
- Priority
- Test Case ID
- Test Case Description
- Test Execution Status
- Defect ID (if any)
- Comments
You can also use color-coding or filters in your matrix. These things will enable you to quickly identify untested or failed requirements.
Now that the matrix is in place. Fill it. Enter the data corresponding to each header in the RTM.
Step 5: Establish Maintenance Processes
To make the most out of your traceability matrix, think of it as a living document. Not something that is one and done. So, do the following things.
Confusing, right? You might be asking how you’re supposed to do that? Well, do the following things.
- Active Tracking: Continuously update the requirements traceability matrix. Especially as tests are executed and defects are reported or resolved. The status fields should reflect real-time progress.
- Change Management: If you’re a seasoned QA person, you might already know that projects evolve. Their requirements are refined, added and removed continuously. So, implement procedures to update the requirements in RTM alongside project documents to reflect these changes.
- Periodic Reviews: Conduct regular audits of the RTM. You can ask the QA leads, product owners or even the project managers to carry out these checks. Why? Because doing so will ensure accuracy and completeness.
Better yet, if you’ve made a matrix using a management tool, integrate the updates into your CI/CD pipeline, where feasible. This will enable automatic status changes throughout the testing lifecycle.
To visually learn how to build a traceability matrix for requirements, watch this video by Online PM Courses.
Example of a Requirements Traceability Matrix
The following table can be seen as a perfect example of a Requirements Traceability Matrix.
| Requirement ID | Requirement Description | Requirement Type | Priority | Test Case ID | Test Case Description | Test Execution Status | Defect ID | Comments |
| R001 | User must log in securely | Functional | High | TC001 | Verify login with valid credentials | Passed | D001 | Initial login feature tested successfully |
| R002 | Password reset functionality | Functional | Medium | TC002 | Test password reset email workflow | Failed | D002 | Email dispatch issue, ticket created |
| R003 | System response time under 2 seconds | Non-functional | High | TC003 | Load testing to verify response time | In Progress | Performance testing underway | |
| R004 | Data encryption at rest | Security | High | TC004 | Verify encryption algorithms | Not Tested | Pending security testing | |
| R005 | User logout invalidates session | Functional | Medium | TC005 | Confirm session is terminated post logout | Passed | Covered in regression suite |
Challenges of Using Spreadsheets for Requirements Traceability
Excel-based RTMs are common. And they’re also easy to use. We know that. But they do have some notable downsides. Which are:
- Complexity and Errors: In Excel, you have to manage so many rows. And besides rows, there are formulas and cross-references that have to be dealt with, leading to potential errors.
- Version Control Issues: Spreadsheets allow multiple collaborators to work together. But it doesn’t show what person did what changes. This can result in conflicts when it comes to versions.
- Limited Updates: When it comes to real-time updates, spreadsheets just aren’t ideal. That’s because every update has to be reflected there manually.
- No Automation: More requirements = more busywork. Manually doing everything increases workloads. Sometimes, changes might be missed because someone forgot to add them to the spreadsheet RTM.
- Scaling Difficulties: When you’ve got a huge project on hand, it might outgrow spreadsheet capacities. After all, Excel can only handle so much.
Fortunately for you, all these problems can be solved. With automated tools. There are many of them out there that can centralize data, provide real-time data management, integrate with CI pipelines and provide built-in reporting.
How Kualitee Can Help with Traceability Management
Some SMEs/testers hold undocumented tribal knowledge, which makes it harder for them to keep up with modern traceability processes. To tackle this, we made Kualitee.
It’s a modern, cloud-based QA test management tool. We’ve designed it to include various features to simplify RTM for teams. The features we’re talking about are:
- Centralized management of requirements, tests and defects.
- Automated traceability linkage and reporting.
- Integration with other popular tools like Jira, so manual work can be reduced.
- Support for hybrid Agile and traditional workflows.
- Intuitive dashboards for real-time visibility.
So, with Kualitee, teams move beyond “death by Excel.” They achieve efficient and trusted traceability that accelerates quality delivery.
Ready to make your traceability process better?
Explore how Kualitee can help you manage your requirements traceability matrix effortlessly. All while improving test coverage and collaboration.
Get started with a free trial of Kualitee today and experience the future of QA management firsthand. No credit card required.
Requirements Traceability in Agile
More often than not, requirements traceability matrices are associated with waterfall models. However, their principles remain relevant in Agile environments as well.
Since Agile projects are characterized by continuous development and changing requirements, requirements traceability matrices have to be adapted sooner or later. And that’s because teams can maintain traceability with them, without slowing the delivery pace.
In Agile:
- Traceability links user stories and acceptance criteria to automated and manual test cases.
- Lightweight RTMs are integrated with tools like Jira to maintain traceability automatically.
- The traceability enables continuous validation in sprint cycles. This bridges Agile’s working software focus with documentation needs.
- Traceability matrices support regulatory demands since they combine flexibility with complete coverage.
Hence, despite cultural resistance to viewing traceability as “clerical,” Agile teams do benefit just as much from automated RTM tools. The reason for that is that these tools reduce overhead and maintain transparency.
Frequently Asked Questions – FAQs
What is a requirements traceability matrix?
A traceability matrix is a document that is used to link project requirements to test cases. Proper coverage and validation are achieved through it.
What is the purpose of a requirements traceability matrix?
To track, verify and validate that all requirements are fulfilled with appropriate test coverage. It enables quality and compliance.
What are the 5 steps of creating a requirements traceability matrix?
The steps are: Define the scope, gather requirements, develop test cases, build the RTM and maintain and update it continuously.
Is requirements traceability used in agile?
Yes. RTMs are adapted for Agile. This is done to track user stories and acceptance criteria for tests, which leads to iterative development.
Can we create a requirements traceability matrix in Jira?
Jira does allow linking requirements and tests. However, a specialized QA tool provides more support for RTM features.
