You want to create a great software product that meets the client’s specifications, as well as the deadline, so how can delivery management help you?
A goal of any business is to increase productivity. Having efficient developers and processes means less time is required to complete a project. With this increase in productivity comes an increase in the bottom line.
In the software development world, it is normal to have tight project deadlines and last-minute additions to the software just before launch date. But these stresses are often due to a lack of efficient processes, and individuals managing them.
Whatever software you are developing, efficiency is the key to smoother workflows and a polished final product.
Streamlining the development process
Developing software that meets the needs of your customer is challenging. Having multiple teams working on a project complicates the matter further. Trying to streamline the development process with teams that have their own processes in place will definitely create difficulties in the development lifecycle of your product.
You need to make sure that somebody is managing all of the project puzzle pieces if you want to deliver a successful and on time software product. This person is a delivery manager.
Delivery management for software development
Delivery management is a philosophy applied by software development companies that incorporates agile and lean practices, delivery support as well as team health and happiness.
Using this approach will help you with the organization, administration, and supervision of the people, processes, and technologies. All of this, along with a detailed plan, will ensure you successfully create the product that your client expects.
What delivery management practices should you have in place to deliver your software successfully?
Improve the speed of delivery, release more frequently, speed up the development cycle, reduce the number of errors and the time to fix these errors sounds like a typical software project.
When working with development and operations on a software development project, you should have the following 4 steps in place if you want a successful software delivery.
- Collaborate
If you have teams working in silos, you are going to have communication issues. Not communicating effectively results in deliverables that need to be reworked, which leads to project delays and additional costs.
These communication problems can also result in deliverables not being shared through the lifecycle efficiently, information not being updated in real time or shared timeously.
Having a collaborative platform ensures all team members work from a single source. Using a single repository will help all team members to work from the same source.
- Improve the speed of software delivery
The way to improve the speed of software delivery is to have constant participation with all of the teams involved in addition to accelerated iterations.
By developing smaller pieces of code, and using lean and agile principles, will get to a finished product quicker.
Improving collaboration and communication between the development and operations teams results in a lean process.
Developing smaller pieces of code that is tested, deployed and sent to the customer for feedback will reach a completed product sooner. Using these lean and agile principles requires both development and operations to work together. This improves collaboration and communication between the teams throughout the development cycle.
- Receive customer feedback earlier
Receiving continuous feedback during the development lifecycle is crucial. Getting feedback from the customer early minimises the risk of developing irrelevant features, and enables teams to respond quickly to changes in scope. Regular feedback helps development stay on track and meet customer expectations, as well as keeping them informed.
This provides a greater level of control and agility in the development lifecycle.
Making customer feedback part of the continuous information flow drives greater efficiency and effectiveness, which can lead to an overall increase in the business value of the software.
- Standardize your processes
Most large organizations use standard processes for their key types of projects. These processes are typically at a high level and the project teams adapt them for their individual needs.
Teams work more efficiently when they have standard processes. These standard processes have fewer delays as a result of errors or rework.
By standardizing your processes across functional teams you will reduce waste and improve productivity.
Symbiotics’ Delivery Management Principles
Symbiotics understands that a project can only be successful with true collaboration, and where everyone is responsible for delivery. It is also vital that everyone work with a shared vision, and in a structured way. This allows the project team members to be proactive rather than reactive to any issues that might arise.
In order to ensure they deliver desired outcomes on time, Symbiotics makes use of the agile development methodology. Lean principles are also maintained to ensure that waste (time and effort) is eliminated during the software development process. These principles also assist in being able to identify any problems early on, avoiding any crisis management.
This means that, not only are their projects fast and efficient from conception to deployment, but you have complete transparency, can monitor progress, can adjust priorities, get quick returns and manage the project budget and timeframes accurately.
They are always looking to new and better ways of shortening the application development cycle both by exploiting the latest technologies and adopting the best of breed processes. Making use of industry best practices, they deliver a solution that promotes your business’ competitive advantage.
Streamlining your software development for now, and the future
Collaborating, developing smaller pieces of code, and using lean and agile principles, getting customer feedback early and standardizing processes will help you have a successful delivery.
Successful project delivery can save time, save money, increase revenue, and help organizations systematically achieve their goals in an effective manner.
You want to have a process in place that streamlines your software development that can successfully and efficiently use multiple teams, and that can be used now and in future projects.
This is delivery management.
Sources
- IBM.com
- https://it.toolbox.com/
