Deb Perelman (eWeek, Oct 22, 2007) points out that faced with a non-stop wave of outsourcing and off-shoring, IT workers must become more than technical. They must "position themselves as liaisons in outsourced relationships."

One skill at the center of this rising demand is the Requirements Analyst.

The virtual nature of outsourced teams drives up the need for written communications sharply, and nowhere is this more important that in the Requirements Specification. Offshore teams, in particular, require three times the level of specification and detail that a local team member needs. This is driven by factors such as lack of proximity, language barriers, and cultural misunderstandings.

If you work as a project manager in a virtual environment like this, you know how frustrating it can be to rework the same function over and over, struggling to get the coders to produce the right thing. A tight spec, combined with clear screen mock-ups or (better) a working prototype can shave days or weeks of frustration off your project.

To win this game in advance and avoid the nightmare spiral of rework, move the management focus away from cheap coders toward better planning. An hour spent writing a tighter definition of what is desired will return huge savings in both time and morale by cutting down rework. A Requirements Analyst has the proper skill set to bridge the gap between business staff and the technical team -- between process thinkers and technology thinkers.