# Questions for Clients

Between the first and second classes of the term, each team will need to set up a meeting time with their client and hold an intial fact-finding meeting. The purpose of this meeting is to fully understand the project, from the perspective of the client.

Before you can start to plan or build anything you need to understand what the client's needs are. Sometimes the client will have something in mind which is not appropriate for the problem that they are trying to solve.

Before this meeting we will provide each team with all the material that the client has provided us with. Every team member should be familiar with the material before the meeting.

During this first meeting you will introduce your team and decide who will be the liasons for the project, both on the client side and on your team's side. Communication works best when the client has one person who can answer questions and your team has one person who asks the questions. This is usually not the team leader.

# Questions

This is a list of possible questions that you can use to learn about the project during your first meeting with the client. Not every question will be appropriate for each project or each client. Use your best judgement when picking the question.

The first set of context-free questions focuses on the customer and other stakeholders, overall goals, and benefits. For example, the requirements engineer might ask:

# Who is behind the request for this work?

Who will use the solution?
Who are the users of the solution?
Who will be the administrators?
Who will maintain the solution after it is built?
What will be the economic benefit of a successful solution?
Is there another source for the solution that you need?

These questions help to identify all stakeholders who will have interest in the software to be built. In addition, the questions identify the measurable benefit of a successful implementation and possible alternatives to custom software development.

The next set of questions enables the software team to gain a better understanding of the problem and allows the customer to voice his or her perceptions about a solution:

How would you characterize "good" output that would be generated by a successful solution?
What problem(s) will this solution address?
Can you show me (or describe) the business environment in which the solution will be used?
Will special performance issues or constraints affect the way the solution is approached?

The final set of questions focuses on the effectiveness of the communication activity itself. Gause and Weinberg call these "meta-questions" and propose the following (abbreviated) list:

Are you the right person to answer these questions?
Are your answers "official"?
Are my questions relevant to the problem that you have?
Am I asking too many questions?
Can anyone else provide additional information?
Should I be asking you anything else?

Additional questions. Choose any that you want from this list or use these questions to come up with ones on your own.

Why do you think you need an app, as opposed to a website?
What do you want your app to accomplish?
What is the first thing you want people to do when they start your app?
What is the second thing you want people to do when they use your app?
Who is your target market? Age, level of technical expertise, disabilities?
Are there any apps or websites that you have seen which are similar to what you are looking to do with your app?
Who are your competitors?
How are your competitors achieving the goals that you expect this app to address?
How will you know when you are satisfied with your site?
Do you have any existing design work (icons, logos, colour schemes, and font faces) that needs to be incorporated in your app?
Do you have any existing copy (text content) that needs to be incorporated in the app?
Do you own the copyrights for the copy and artwork?
Do you have a preference for an individual platform that will be used for your app?
Do you have a reason for wanting the app to be developed on that specific platform?
What will your app do that a website cannot do?
How would you summarize what your app does in three sentences? (this will make them focus on their true goals of the app)
Are there any regulations about your industry / business that I should be aware of regarding your app or the content on your app?
Do you have an existing app or website that does any part of what you want this app to achieve?
If there is another app or site, what do you want to keep or discard of that functionality?
Who is the person within your company who can answer design-related questions?
Who is the person within your company who can answer technical questions?
Who is the person within your company who can answer questions about content?
Who is the person within your company responsible for signing off at the key milestones?
Do you have any internal design or technical planning documents that you have created previously in early stage planning for this app?

This is NOT an exhaustive list of questions.