Start with the section that hurts the most: scope
You have a template. You have a project. You open the document, stare at the first blank field, and suddenly every section looks equally intimidating. The instinct is to start at the top and work down, filling in headings as you go. That is exactly the wrong approach.
In my experience, the most valuable thing you can do when you sit down with a blank BRD template is to go straight to the scope section first. Not the executive summary, not the background, not the glossary. Scope. Get that boundary drawn clearly before you write a single requirement, because every other section in the document either depends on it or tests it. Once you know what is in and what is out, the rest of the template starts to organise itself.
Understand what each section is actually asking you to do
Most BRD templates follow a broadly similar structure, but the section headings can be misleading. “Background” does not mean a history lesson. “Objectives” does not mean a list of things the project team wants to achieve. Understanding what each section is genuinely asking for is the difference between a document that helps stakeholders make decisions and one that gets shelved after the first review.
Here is how I read the core sections of a standard BRD template and what I actually put in each one:
- Business context: Two or three sentences that explain the situation driving the project, written for someone who has never attended a project meeting. Keep it factual and brief.
- Problem statement: A precise description of the gap or pain point the project is solving, not the solution. If you find yourself describing technology in this section, you have drifted into solution space.
- Objectives and goals: Measurable outcomes, not activities. “Reduce manual data entry by 40% within six months of go-live” is an objective. “Implement a self-service portal” is not.
- Scope: Both what is included and what is explicitly excluded. The exclusions column is just as important as the inclusions, and skipping it will cost you later.
- Stakeholders: Names, roles, and influence level, not just job titles. This section informs your sign-off strategy at the end of the project.
- Business requirements: What the business needs the solution to do or enable, expressed independently of any specific technology. Each requirement should be testable.
- Assumptions and constraints: Anything you are taking as given that has not been formally confirmed, and any boundaries that limit the solution design.
- Dependencies: Other projects, systems, or decisions that your project relies on or affects. These are a common source of late-stage surprises if you do not surface them early.
If your template has additional sections such as current state description, future state description, or operational scenarios, treat those as structured prompts to run stakeholder workshops, not as sections you can fill in from your own knowledge alone. I have seen BRDs fail review because the BA wrote the current state from memory rather than validating it with subject matter experts.
How to fill in the requirements section without drowning in scope creep
The requirements section is where most BRDs either come alive or collapse into a list of loosely connected wishes. The template gives you rows and columns, but it does not tell you how to decide what belongs there.
My approach is to group requirements by business capability or user journey first, then number them within each group. This makes the document easier to review with stakeholders and easier to trace later using a requirements traceability matrix. Flat numbered lists that run from REQ-001 to REQ-087 with no grouping logic are genuinely painful to review in a workshop setting, and they tend to hide gaps.
For each requirement I write, I ask three questions before I move on: Is it testable? Is it free of solution assumptions? Has at least one stakeholder confirmed it as a genuine need? If the answer to any of those is no, the requirement goes into a parking lot until I can resolve it, not into the main body of the document.
When you are unsure whether something is a business requirement or a functional requirement, the distinction between a BRD and an FRD is worth revisiting. Keeping that boundary clean inside your template will save significant rework downstream.
A worked example: where a well-structured template still hit a wall
On a large operating model transformation project for Organisation A, a utilities company, the project team was working through a future state operating model for a shared services function. The BA team had a solid BRD template, structured with the same core sections I described above: context, problem statement, goals, current state, future state, and a requirements table broken out by functional area.
The current state workshops went well. Pain points were documented across onboarding, performance management, mandatory training records, and workforce planning. The problem statement was crisp. The goals table included measurable targets aligned to the organisational strategy. On paper, the BRD was shaping up well.
The friction came when we reached the future state requirements section and attempted to get sign-off on the scope boundary. The HR leadership team had agreed in workshops that the new model would shift probation review tracking responsibility from the central HR team to hiring managers, supported by automated system alerts. That decision was documented clearly in the scope and limitations section of the template. When the draft BRD went to the broader management group for review, three business unit managers pushed back hard. They argued that their teams lacked the capacity to manage probation timelines without direct HR support, and that the assumption that line managers would adopt self-service functions had never been tested with them directly.
The decision had to be revisited. We ran a separate validation session with the business unit managers, which surfaced a genuine constraint: two of the three business units had line managers who were geographically dispersed across regional sites and had inconsistent access to the HRMS. The scope boundary was revised. The requirement was rewritten to specify that system alerts would be supplemented by a shared calendar integration for managers without reliable system access, and the limitation around direct HR support was removed from the document.
That revision added ten days to the sign-off timeline, but it produced a far more accurate document. The lesson I took from it: the assumptions and constraints section of your BRD template is not a formality. It is a live risk register dressed up in requirements clothing. Treat it that way.
Common mistakes when using a BRD template for the first time
After reviewing dozens of BRDs written by early career BAs, the mistakes tend to cluster around the same handful of patterns.
| Mistake | What it looks like | What to do instead |
|---|---|---|
| Filling in every section from memory | The current state reads like a guess and SMEs dispute it in review | Run a structured workshop to validate current state before writing |
| Confusing objectives with activities | “Implement digital self-service for HR transactions” in the objectives section | Rewrite objectives as measurable outcomes with a timeframe |
| Leaving the exclusions column blank | Stakeholders assume everything adjacent to the project is in scope | Explicitly list what is out of scope using the same categories as inclusions |
| Writing solution-specific requirements | “The system shall use a SharePoint form to capture…” in the business requirements | Remove technology references and express the underlying business need |
| Treating the template as sequential | Completing sections top to bottom before any stakeholder input | Use the template as a checklist of conversations to have, not a form to complete alone |
Getting to sign-off: the review and approval process
A BRD template typically includes an approvals or sign-off section. This is the section most BAs leave blank until the last moment, then scramble to complete under deadline pressure. I handle it differently: I populate the approvers table at the very start of the project, as part of the initial stakeholder mapping exercise.
Knowing who needs to sign off changes how you write the document. If one of your approvers is the Finance Director, you make sure the business case linkage and the measurable objectives are crystal clear. If another is the Head of Operations, you make sure the current state pain points and the operational scenario section reflect their team’s experience accurately. Writing for a known audience produces a sharper document than writing for a generic stakeholder.
Before you send the document for formal review, run it past one person who was not involved in the workshops. Ask them to read the scope and requirements sections cold and tell you what they think the project is delivering. If their answer does not match yours, the document is not yet clear enough to go to sign-off. This five-minute test has saved me from at least half a dozen difficult review meetings over the years.
If you are looking for a ready-to-use starting point, the BRD template in Word format on this site is structured to support the approach described in this article, with prompts built into each section to guide what good content looks like.
The real value of a BRD template is not the structure it provides, it is the discipline it forces. Every blank field is a question you have not yet answered, and every unanswered question at sign-off is a risk that will resurface during build. The template does not write the requirements for you, but used deliberately and worked through with your stakeholders rather than in isolation, it gives you the clearest possible picture of what the project actually needs to deliver before anyone writes a line of code or starts redesigning a process.
Frequently asked questions
How do I fill in a business requirements document template step by step?
Start with the scope section before anything else, as it anchors every other section in the document. Then work through the problem statement, objectives, current state, and requirements in that order, validating each section with relevant stakeholders before moving on. Do not complete the template in isolation from the people who own the business problem.
What should go in the business requirements section of a BRD template?
Each requirement should describe what the business needs to be true or to be able to do, without specifying how the solution will deliver it. Requirements should be testable, free of technology assumptions, and confirmed by at least one stakeholder who has authority over that area. Group them by business capability or user journey rather than listing them in a flat numbered sequence.
What is the difference between a business requirement and a functional requirement in a BRD?
A business requirement describes a business need or outcome, such as the ability to track mandatory training compliance across all staff. A functional requirement describes how a system or process will meet that need, such as a dashboard that flags overdue training records by team. Business requirements belong in the BRD; functional requirements typically live in a separate FRD.
How long should a business requirements document be?
There is no fixed length, but most BRDs for mid-sized projects run between 10 and 25 pages. The right length is determined by the complexity of the scope and the number of requirements, not by a page count target. A concise, well-structured 12-page BRD is more useful than a padded 40-page one that loses stakeholder attention.
Who needs to sign off on a business requirements document?
Typically the project sponsor, the business owner of the affected area, and any senior stakeholders whose teams will be directly impacted by the change. In regulated environments such as government or utilities, a compliance or legal representative may also be required. Identify your approvers at the start of the project and write the document with their specific concerns in mind.
Try Ash, Your Virtual BA
If you have a BRD template open right now and you are not sure what to write in a particular section, Ash can help you work through it. Ash is a virtual BA assistant that can take your project context and help you draft requirements, sharpen your problem statement, or work through your scope boundary. It is the fastest way to go from a blank template to a structured first draft that is ready for stakeholder review.
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Further reading
- Successfully Documenting Requirements for a Project | IIBA® Business Analysis Blog
- How to Report Requirements | IIBA
Written by Sam Cordes, founder of the Business Analyst’s Toolkit.