97 Things Every Project Manager Should Know

Chapter 8. Keep It Simple, Simon

M. Tech. Krishna Kadali

STAKEHOLDERS OF THE PROJECT often make things more complicated than they need to be. This a common cause of software project failures. The team members of the project must have the ability to completely visualize the objectives of the project and complete actual work. Stakeholders, however, can accomplish the project in several simple, magical steps in their own minds. They imagine achieving the end solution quickly and easily, no matter how complex it is.

Stakeholders should not build a software project as a monolithic, gigantic, inflexible monster; instead they should allow the information technology team to build it like an onion, with each layer enhancing its maturity. There is no other alternative in the world of reality. Regardless of the completeness of the requirements, there will always be change. If your software is not flexible enough to quickly adapt to changing requirements, the project is dead even before it has begun.

To keep things simple, following are the key points to keep in mind:

• Keep the requirements simple. The business analysts often confuse a particular solution that came to their mind with the actual customer requirement based on a business need. Although the real requirement may be something very simple, there may be a communications gap between business analysts and programmer/developers since neither ...