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Metrics are essential measurements to determine if a project is meeting the established goals of time, delivery and budget constraints. This may be a bit off the requirements blog norm, but worth the mention.
There has been a change in the market where the ROI (Return on Investment) is not a requirement in the eyes on projects. Is the ROI forecast replaced by a focus upon the financial burn? Are people considering what was spent to arrive at the solution and counting up the cost after the fact? It is important to track what was spent and if the project arrived on, under, or over budget. Some organizations are of the thought, “Just track the burn.” Financial disaster, monetary suicide, bad judgment, new line of thought; you be the judge.
In these troubled financial times when institutions are trimming the fat and jobs, not laying the foundation of financial success can be the road to financial ruin. There are some necessary projects where the ROI does not have the deciding impact but when it becomes company standard not to have an ROI there is a backlash to pay. The focus of the “get the most for the dollars spent with the best solution” is vanishing in some firms because the preverbal purse strings are open. What happens when the well runs dry?
Is sober financial planning disappearing? The ROI is a metric norm to follow and it appears it is giving way to the free will spend, spend, spend until it is gone. There’s a new program to align with without the old metric. ROI is worth the effort, right?
Details give the advantage of listing specifics to create a picture of a well-defined outcome. Specific details on a form include: name in the top right corner, account number left margin, indentation above the name, etc.. General statements in requirements only cause additional discussions during fact-finding sessions, which is something that can be avoided. For example, stating a requirement that says, “Demographic information must be collected and stored in a central location,” will incur discussions because a general statement is just that: a general statement and not a true requirement. Questions like, “What demographic, patient, vendors, doctor, associate, site location, sales region, third party are desired?” Drill down to specifics: first name, last name, middle name, phone, address (street, state, zip, and country), measurements (length, width, depth) and so on. Specifics provide a commodity savings (time!) for later use. Time is the one resource that once used cannot be regained.
This a first in a five part series surrounding writing sound, concrete requirements, how to identify and recover from the poorly written and employing techniques to gather aspirations. It makes good sense to do the research into “what to achieve” and here’s why. Requirements, depending upon how well they are written and/or researched, can give a project an ease of understandability or dispense an undercurrent to slow progress to the speed slower than an earth slug or worse, ensue confusion to halt project momentum and cause tempers to flare!