Designing Software For SuccessThe Software Development Lifecycle
Business analysts and technologists can build software and systems to do almost anything. That doesn’t mean anyone wants to buy or use these systems. Just ask Microsoft about Windows Vista or their Kin phone. These “solutions” created more problems than they solved for both Microsoft and its customers.
Every software product on the market emerges from a Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). What happens during the SDLC determines if the new software is hailed as a cost-effective solution, or just another expensive set of problems.
Through years of development experience, Electronic Ink has proven that augmenting an SDLC with real product development skills and techniques offers the best, lowest-risk SDLC. That’s because product develoment methods bring designers into the development process early and make testing and design changes affordable. Incorporated into such methodologies as the popular Waterfall and Agile development methods, an SDLC integrating the product development model drives out risk before exhausting the budget, allowing business and technology to achieve a common vision and success in the marketplace.
Waterfall Method: Building Under Assumptions
The Waterfall SDLC builds cost and risk steadily as it lumbers toward user acceptance testing – which doesn’t even test the software in real conditions or with actual end users. The company invests the most resources in coding prior to the proof of concept, and design and technical flaws come to surface late in the process, after most of the budget is spent. Corrections are expensive and time consuming, and true innovation based on real-world testing is nearly impossible. Development teams, because they create the code driving the Proof of Concept, are left shouldering the blame for a poorly-designed tool.
Agile | Rapid Method: Sprinting to Second Rate
The Agile (or, Rapid) SDLC produces the end product through short “sprints” of activity. Agile redistributes cost but does not reduce up-front risk or guarantee a better product. Although design and redesign of development pieces occur from early on, there is no way to know until late in the design process if the pieces will work together. Once again, the budget and timeline are spent well before ROI is assured. Because business stakeholders have reviewed the developed components, technologists are no longer alone when the Proof of Concept fails to meet the expectations of end user communities.
The Product Development Method: Right the First Time
The product development method, along with having designers on the team ready to make any necessary changes throughout the process, reduces risk from the start. The design team works with the client, developers and end users, identifying requirements and solutions, building, testing, and redesigning with low-cost, pliable prototypes, like sketches and wireframes. Design prototypes are tested on end users, and their feedback – even when it calls for major requirements or design adjustments – can be incorporated into design without breaking the budget. Major expenditures on coding occur only after the proof of concept is proven viable. The product development techniques and skills can be integrated into existing Waterfall and Agile methods.
Electronic Ink’s unique approach to the design and build of digital products, as well as its unwavering concern for the user of computer-driven products and services, has attracted leaders to award landmark projects to Electronic Ink. The company’s client roster includes AstraZeneca International, Bloomberg, the New York Stock Exchange, and Reuters, to name a few.
To learn more about Electronic Ink, please call 215.922.3800 or visit www.electronicink.com.