Software Development

How can you evaluate the performance of your IT Development Team?

The question is worth asking and not easy to answer; how can you evaluate the performance of your IT development team with certainty?

Evaluating the performance of an IT Development team is not as easy as it sounds. The fact is that IT projects vary greatly in scope, budget and schedule; in this context, it is difficult to compare!

In this post, we will not discuss “mathematical” methods such as the “function point” (FFP) method that allows you to evaluate the necessary load associated with a development in terms of points.  This evaluation gives constant results, what changes is the number of hours required by the development team to program a function point. Unfortunately these methods are not very common.

We will talk about some of the basics…

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Hiring internal IT resources or hire an external firm: the dilemma of every IT Project and a key decision for the Project Manager.

It is true, a new IT Project always calls for a fundamental decision from the Project Manager: should I hire internal IT resources or hire an external firm?

Every IT Project is first and foremost a Management and Logistics challenge. In the sense that each IT project brings its own challenges, its own customer requirements and, at the same time, its own needs in terms of expertise and resources.

The Project Manager must first clearly define the nature of the IT development project to match it with the expertise of his Development team.

The Challenge of IT Resources Scarcity at the Dawn of the 21st Century

The magnitude of the Software Development Project Management and Logistics challenge should not be underestimated. In fact, many companies have been involuntarily slowing down their growth in recent years due to bottlenecks in their internal processes, mainly because of resource scarcity.

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Every IT Project is first and foremost a challenge to evaluate the required capacity and expertise. Indeed, the Manager must constantly re-evaluate the adequacy of his Development team to deliver the next IT Project; both in terms of capacity and expertise.

Information technology tools and technologies play a key role in achieving the growth objectives of companies. More specifically, the automation of certain critical processes can generate a dizzying increase in productivity or a significant improvement in the quality of products and/or customer service.

Consequently, any decision in terms of IT development will have a major impact on the company’s competitiveness and profitability.

In this context, more than one IT Director will spontaneously turn to commercial software to meet the software development demand required to support the company’s growth objectives.

So, in many ways, it seems to us that this is an easy solution for the IT Director and we understand these reasons well:

• The IT Director believes he can quickly fill a capacity gap with a tool that automates certain processes
• The IT Director relies on a known and recognized solution to minimize the risk associated with a Development Project
• The IT Director hopes that the implementation of the commercial solution will be done in a shorter time frame
• The IT Director hopes to minimize his risk by using a solution already developed

While this all sounds very logical, we argue that there is another option that is just as viable and perhaps more profitable; that of the external software development firm.

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eMalaya is a Project Management and Time Sheet entry tool that calculates projections; that is to say, it accumulates the hours executed and the “remaining work” to be done of a Development Project. And this calculation brings a new perspective on Project Management for the greater benefit of Project Managers, Administrators and Clients; the knowledge of the true state of a Project.

IT Projects are almost always complex, involve many resources, and often take several months to complete. And over time, the vast majority of IT Projects will face potential pitfalls or new Client requests, both of which will result in schedule and cost overruns.

In this context, it is not easy for the Project Manager to monitor his Projects in real time and evaluate the performance of Development Team.

In order to get a clear view, the Project Manager must almost always collect project data from different systems. Moreover, the main Project Management software (DevOps / Jira) only looks to the future; that is to say, it only calculates the Remaining Work without taking into account the hours executed.

These different estimates will have important repercussions for all stakeholders of a Project: Developers, Managers, Administrators and Clients.

So how do you know where you really stand in terms of performance of the Development Team, the Budget (Billing) and the Schedule?  How can you get a clear real-time vision of a Project?  Is it possible to objectively evaluate the actual status of a Project; that is to say, to know precisely the actual hours executed by the Developers plus the estimated hours of work remaining to be done by these same Developers for all of their Tasks?

In fact, we are talking here about a new concept in Project Management; the Projection, that is to say the addition of the real time work done plus the remaining work to be done. Interesting, isn’t it!

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Isn’t it time to offer managers a new perspective on Project Management that would allow them to adequately monitor Projects in real time and, in addition, to properly evaluate the performance of the Development Team?

The fact is that the Manager has to take up more than one challenge in the Management of Development Projects, software or other; the task is arduous!

Indeed, IT Projects are almost always complex, involve many resources, and often take several months to complete. In addition, to obtain a clear vision, the Project Manager must almost always collect Project data from different systems.To obtain a clear picture, the Project Manager must almost always collect project data from different systems.

Thus, almost all software development teams use two systems daily:

1. DevOps or Jira
2. Time sheet entry application

And almost all Project Managers and Clients complain about the same things:

1. Lack of visibility on the degree of progress of the project(s)
2. Lack of metrics
3. Having to deal with cost and schedule overruns

What is a Projection?

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How do you identify your software development priority in times of pandemic as several companies are currently experiencing its repercussions.  As the Prime Minister said, some are “on pause” while others are unable to find the necessary employees to meet demands.

One thing remains though, what did not perform well before the pandemic, is still not performing well during the pandemic and will not perform well afterwards.  However, we will return to performance issues in a context of pandemic and economic downturn in a future post.

Of course, you could also embark on the Digital Transformation project, which we have already discussed at length in previous posts, or on an Agile Transformation project, i.e. the integration of Agility into the enterprise. These projects are certainly very worthwhile, but we have something else in mind for you.

Identifying software development priorities in times of pandemic?

For some companies, it will be a question of doing more with less, while for others, it will simply be a question of doing better?

Indeed, any IT manager will seek either a gain in productivity or a gain in performance.  However, there is a third path that is less obvious but certainly just as profitable, the path of Intelligence (not artificial, that is ?).

So, if your company is on idle, why not take advantage of this time to recover Business Intelligence? Such a Business Intelligence-oriented software development project, while requiring good thinking, will not sideline your critical applications. Moreover, whether it is Financial or related to your Customers, this Business Intelligence will prove to be an invaluable competitive advantage in the recovery.

Now, is Business Intelligence identified as a software development priority in your company? It should.

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Two facts play against custom software development:

• The market is full of comprehensive software solutions such as Oracle, SAP, IBM, Salesforce, etc.
• Horror stories are on the side of major software development projects

Considering these facts, over the years companies have chosen to install commercial software solutions (CRM, ERP, accounting software, loan management system, etc.) instead of custom software development.  And in many cases, they replaced a “home” application whose technology was obsolete.

Of course, a lot of time and effort has gone into tailoring these business solutions to “your” reality to turn into customized solutions that really meet your needs. If you encounter one of the two situations below, rest assured, you are not the only one in this situation:

• You have different systems that do not talk to each other
• You still have specific business needs that are not met by your commercial software solutions

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The assessment of software development performance, be it of a software development team or a software development project will vary greatly depending on the type of metrics used.

This request for performance assessment in software development projects is constantly coming back and is a source of major concern for Managers; which is quite normal considering the low ratio of projects delivered in time… and costs.

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Process performance and innovation create a bond of heart and reason within any flourishing business or, at the very least, any enterprise must become innovative in order to flourish because innovation almost always leads to a gain in performance on one level or another.

Thus, the company that wants to perform must innovate and the innovative company will perform… most certainly!

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Microsoft talks a lot about Intelligence, Big Data, AI and Machine Learning and it is moving ahead at a pace on all fronts by enhancing its new Office 365 + Dynamics 365 Integrated Productivity Suite with some of these tools; it is worth asking how you should align your Software Development to make the best of this new offer?

Microsoft promises to add to its Integrated Productivity Suite such tools as Power BI, Cortana Intelligence Suite, MyAnalytics, Tap for Word, QuickStarter for PowerPoint, etc.; one has to admit that it’s a pretty powerful combination of business tools for any enterprise, no matter the size. But is your IT Department ready to benefit from it?

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Your Software Development is based upon and targets enhanced Productivity perfectly integrated with your business process? Well then, the new Microsoft offering should please you.

Clearly, Microsoft intends on positioning itself in the VSBs (Very Small Business) and SMBs market segments by deploying, far beyond Office automation, a new business offering around Integrated Productivity encapsulating both Collaboration and Business Development (CRM & BD,  Clientele Service and Sales and…).

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Do we have to remind the positive impact on both productivity and profitability of Custom Software Development and digital technologies? Not really. Nevertheless, it might be interesting to understand its nature, how this impact comes into play, at which levels.

A 2015 study from Deloitte & MIT Sloan shows that digitally mature enterprises are very much focused on globally integrating digital technologies such as Integrated Systems, Social Media, Mobility, Analytics and Cloud to transform their business process while enterprises digitally less mature are concentrating on solving specific problems with specific technologies.

The key words here being « globally integrating » ; it’s by integrating globally digital technologies that enterprises transform their business process and their way of doing business, therefore, there must be a global integration strategy of digital technologies and Custom Software Development into play.

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