Improving requirements engineering processes in very small software enterprises through the use of a collaborative application

Very small software enterprises (up to 25 employees) represent the most important software task force around the world. Several researches report these organizations remain a low success rate in development projects, because they implement inefficient mechanisms to support requirements engineering practices. This paper presents a collaborative software application, named Software Requirements Manager (SRM), which automates several requirements engineering practices. This tool acts as a communication and coordination space for team members. SRM has been used in a software development academic scenario during the last three years. The obtained results show that SRM can significantly improve the projects' success rate by facilitating the collaboration among members of the development team.