Traceability Matrix and its Benefits in Project Management

This article discusses the concept of traceability matrix and its benefits in project management. It defines traceability matrix and explains how it helps in evaluating different system components and project requirements. The article also highlights the benefits of traceability matrix, such as simplifying defect triage, improving test case management, and avoiding multiple tool usage. The article includes a figure of traceability matrix and references for further reading.

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Project Management
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Table of Contents
Traceability Matrix..........................................................................................................................3
Benefits of Traceability Matrix.......................................................................................................4
Figure 1: Traceability Matrix.......................................................................................................5
References........................................................................................................................................7

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Traceability Matrix
Traceability matrix can be defined as a particular document that is useful to correlate as
well as identify different kinds of operations that are carried out in the business, business
applications, security and any other kind of requirements that can be implemented in the business
organization. It can be also used for the testing and completion of the different business
operations. According to, Chitre et al. (2017) the traceability matrix helps in the evaluation of the
different system components and also relates in between them to provide the status of the
different kind of project requirements in terms of the completion of the project. The main use of
the traceability matrix can be seen in the development projects of the software, in order to locate,
identify and judge it as a specific functionality or component developed accordingly.
Generally a traceability matrix is termed as the type of document or worksheet that
consists of a large number of tables. For example when a software is being developed by the
organization, the software will have to be evaluated for completion with the help of the
traceability matrix, requirements of the project can also be placed within the left column and the
pertaining test cases can be placed on the top row (Jeong, Cho & Lee, 2018). The completion of
the project requirement and the test case will leave a mark on a particular intersection of the
chart and all of the different requirements can be included to calculate the status of the software
completion. The easy calculation will thus help the organization to gain a detailed insight into
whether the software will be fit for commercial use or not.
The application of the concept of traceability matrix to the requirements of the project
will always provide the requirements specification (Yoo & Choi, 2017). In most simple words,
Requirements Traceability Matrix can be termed as the particular tool that generally traces

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requirement through the process of validation. For example Analysis of the requirements of the
project, designing of the test in the project, Execution of the Test and the closure phase.
Benefits of Traceability Matrix
The benefits of Traceability Matrix are immense in the modern competitive world where
technology has surrounded each and every portion of the business world (Jeong, Cho & Lee,
2018). The IT experts are involved in creation of new, latest and the most improved technologies
in order to bring changes to the organization and make it more productive. The Traceability
Matrix thus forms immense importance and provides large number of benefits to the
organizations. Some of the major benefits of the Traceability Matrix are as follows;
a. Simplify the defect triage for large backlogs in defects-The consideration of the large
scale transformation programs involving IT is the delivery of software packages to large
scale or a medium scale companies. The transformation process in such an economy of
scale is always a complicated process and a product that is considered to be the by-
product of such a complexity are the issues that will have an impact on the test manager
in a strong manner. It is quite normal for the large scale programs involving Information
technology to have a problem with hundreds of such different defects in the
organization’s software program. The time of finalizing the scope for the
commercialization of the software, one will be picking up the most priority based tasks.
In the above example, a similar Matrix can help a person to quickly round in on defects
connected to the most important needs before filtering for defect priority, severity, etc.

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Figure 1: Traceability Matrix
Source: (Padmavathi & Saravanan, 2017)
b. Improvement in the management of test case- Another major benefit for the business
organizations by using the Traceability Matrix is the dependability of a good test case
management on Traceability. According to, Vale et al. (2017) the supervising managers
have the capability to plan in a much better and organized manner and organize the
amount of testing the needed and totally eradicate duplication as well as any form of
leakage. The tracking of the test coverage becomes a breeze and significantly reduces the
manually operated checking procedures that are necessarily normal in nature.
c. Integrations- The use of just one tool is suitable for the management of a particular
project. However the availability and the increasing demand for the tools has led to the
use of a multiple number of tools and also converted the single usage tools to multiple

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usage ones. However, the use of a multiple number of tools can be harmful for the project
and thus the management of the organization can use the traceability matrix to avoid the
multiple usages of tools. A good traceability matrix will have the capability to provide
seamless trace to the progress and the needs penetrated into the different defects gathered
from the test cases that are descripted using different types of tools to complete the
project.

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References
Chitre, B., Hayes, J. H., Dekhtyar, A., & Fong, V. (2017). Automated Requirements
Traceability. Grand Challenges of Traceability: The Next Ten Years, 11.
Jeong, S., Cho, H., & Lee, S. (2018, May). Agile requirement traceability matrix. In Proceedings
of the 40th International Conference on Software Engineering: Companion
Proceeedings (pp. 187-188). ACM.
Kim, D. (2016). A Suggestion on a Better Template for Requirements Traceability Matrix of a
Requirements Specification. Journal of the Korea Society of Systems Engineering, 12(1),
1-5.
Padmavathi, R., & Saravanan, P. (2017). New Frameworks for Automated Test and Retest
(ATRT) Test Case Requirement Traceability Matrix. development, 1(2).
Vale, T., de Almeida, E. S., Alves, V., Kulesza, U., Niu, N., & de Lima, R. (2017). Software
product lines traceability: A systematic mapping study. Information and Software
Technology, 84, 1-18.
Yoo, J., & Choi, Y. J. (2017). RELAP-7 Software Verification and Validation Plan:
Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM) Update and Code Verification Strategy (No.
INL/EXT-17-43199-Rev000). Idaho National Lab.(INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States).