Software Product Need a Tune-Up? Don’t Focus on the Fix. Re-Engineer for Success!
Let me tell you a story. My friend, Shaniqua just got a new job and found, to her dismay, that her first project involved the re-engineering of a software product the business had introduced to the market (to less than favorable response). I talked to Shaniqua on the phone and we discussed her conundrum. The business loved the software product but consumers had a lot of issues with its responsiveness, the lack of an intuitive user experience (Ux) design and many other details, including loading data that was integrated from other sources. In short, the original software product design and development was less than stellar and now the company was paying the price.
Shaniqua decided to scrap the original partnership and go with an IT consultant that had more experience in software product design and development (a wise decision all around). When a software product or software application is built from the ground up, there are lots of opportunities for innovation and, if a business is using a good software product development team, the frameworks, platforms and tools can be chosen appropriately to achieve the best outcomes and quality methodologies and testing can ensure success.
When considering the daunting task of reengineering a software product, the choice of a consulting partner is equally important but the issues are very different. Unless the business is planning to totally scrap the software product and start over, the software re-engineering roadmap must take a comprehensive look at the existing solution and how to best improve performance, user access and adoption, scalability, security, integration and many other factors. The team must also plan for growth and expansion and changing requirements and the software product must meet standards and comply with regulations, with financial projections for the product and with the business plan. That’s a lot!
One of the things I pointed out to Shaniqua is that this software reengineering initiative provided a valuable opportunity to refine product requirements and, while it would be tempting to simply ‘fix the problems’, the business should take another look at market analysis, comparative analysis, and functional and technical specifications to facilitate and accelerate growth and market success. Convincing the management team and the keepers of the purse strings to see this software re-engineering as an opportunity rather than a problem to be quickly fixed might not be the easiest thing to do but, if the business does not take the time to do it right, they are likely to be in the same position next year!
If your software product is stumbling in the market or if you (and your customers) like the product, but would like to tweak and reengineer the offering to better suit the trends and the market, look first for the best IT consulting expert – one with plenty of experience in software product development and software re-engineering services: Software Product Development Services,
