Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 11.1
Examples of financial and non-financial business objective
Financial
Nonfinancial
Capture a market share of X % within Y
months
Achieve a customer satisfaction measure of at
least X within Y months of release
Increase market share in region X by Y % in Z
months
Process as least X transactions per day with at
least Y % accuracy
Reach a sales volume of X units or revenue of
$Y within Z months
Achieve a specified time to market that
provides clear business advantages
Achieve X % profit or return on investment
within Y months
Develop a robust platform for a family of
related products
Achieve positive cash flow on this product
within Y months
Develop specific core technology competencies
in the organization with competency
measured in some way
Save $X per year by replacing a high-
maintenance legacy system
Be rated as the top product for reliability in
published product reviews by a specific date
Keep unit materials cost below X dollars per
unit in the expected Y year lifetime of the
product
Maintain staff turnover below X % through the
end of the project
Reduce support costs by X % within Y months
Comply with a specific set of Federal and state
regulations
Receive no more than X service calls per unit
and Y warranty calls per unit within Z
months after shipping
Reduce turnaround time to X hours on Y % of
customer support calls
document. Some software project management plan templates include a section on
management objectives and priorities, which could contain business objectives and
stakeholder analysis. Other information might go into other project guiding doc-
uments, such as a quality assurance plan that contains product release criteria. As
the team gets into design and implementation, they might discover certain business
objectives to be unattainable. The cost of materials might be higher than planned
or cutting-edge technologies might not work as expected. Business realities also
can change, along with evolving marketplace demands or reduced profit forecasts.
Under such circumstances, you'll need to modify your business objectives and
reassess to see whether the project is still worth pursuing (Wiegers
2009
).
A project achieves success by delivering suitable value to various stakeholders.
Begin your quest for success by identifying these stakeholders and what is
important to them. ''Value'' could translate to time savings for a corporate
department, market dominance for a commercial software vendor, or increased
productivity for a user. Look for stakeholders both inside and outside the devel-
opment organization. Next, perform a stakeholder analysis to reveal the expecta-
tions each stakeholder group has for the project.
Identify each stakeholder's interests; Interests include financial benefits, spe-
cific time to market, required functionality, performance targets, usability, reli-
ability, or other quality characteristics. Then evaluate how the project will be
affected if each interest is or is not satisfied. The project might not be able to fully
satisfy everyone's interests. This analysis will help you determine which interests
are the most compelling.
