Stakeholder Needs in Systems Engineering: A Proposal for a Formal Definition

Stakeholder needs are the basis for the derivation of technical requirements in systems engineering. However, current definitions of stakeholder needs do not clearly distinguish stakeholder needs from requirements and do not provide a clear characterization. A clear distinction would especially allow the relationship of needs and requirements to be analyzed in the model of SGE - System Generation Engineering. The aim this contribution is the definition and formulation of stakeholder needs in systems engineering, as well as their description in the model of SGE. For this purpose, a systematic literature review is conducted to examine how stakeholder needs are described literature. The definition proposed based on these results is then evaluated in two industrial studies. A case study at a German vehicle manufacturer has shown that the characteristics of the definition can be found in practice and a study at a German industrial machine manufacturer has shown that the definition can help product developers to identify stakeholder needs.