The key to any successful software development is clearly defining the project's objective before you start. One of the most important considerations in defining a project objective is identifying the specific outcomes you want to achieve.

To establish the objectives, we have found that a facilitated workshop including key customer stakeholders and Taten staff is the most efficient and effective way of establishing a successful outcome.

Stakeholder buy in

Prior to commencing any software development project, it is important to get buy in from all the relevant stakeholders even though they are may not be directly involved in the solution. It is not uncommon for a project to be developed to satisfy the objectives of the relevant business stakeholders, only for board members, and other stakeholders who may approve the funding of the project to be critical of the outcome. This often happens when there has been insufficient discussion around the key decisions, objectives and audience outcomes that are required.

Approval process identification

Prior to the commencement of any software development project, it is important to identify who is going to be part of the approval process and what role they are going to play. Equally it is important to schedule these resources into the overall project timetable. In projects where the number of stakeholders may be large, to ensure that the project is kept on schedule, it may be important to empower someone in the project team with the “power of veto” in the event a consensus can’t be reached in the timeframe required for the decision.

Roles and responsibilities

To minimise the development effort, it is important to identify the roles and responsibilities of the team members who will be involved with the project development and its ongoing operation. For key staff it is important to ensure that these responsibilities are acknowledged in the person’s position description and that individuals involved have sufficient capacity to fulfil these responsibilities during the development and operational phases.

Call to action flow and response workflows

Once the project objectives have been established, the calls to action and process flows required to create the desired outcome need to be designed and agreed to by the relevant stakeholders. It is important to design these calls to action early in the process so their implementation can be optimised throughout the entire development process.

Mental Modelling

With nearly 20 years working with the Internet and the World Wide Web, Taten has seen many things come and go.  One of the most new and innovative ways that we have seen of addressing audience needs and segmentation in any software development, is the concept of the Mental Model. 

In essence, a Mental Model is how users think about and approach their tasks and goals. It represents the way in which users do something - for example, how they solve a problem, or complete a process.  For projects where the user experience is vital to the success of the project, Taten recommends undertake a Mental Modelling exercise.  To read more about Mental Modelling - click here

Information architecture

- is the art and science of expressing a model or concept for information . In the context of any software project, this is a vital phase where the information flow is organised and labelled. Taten believes that as soon as the project outcomes and software purpose have been identified, the information architecture needs to be defined prior to any other design commencing. Once set, the information architecture will guide the project developmet.

Creative approach

Any creative requirements need to be decided on early in the project lifecycle and need to be consistent with the brand values, audience and available budget.

Page type identification

Whether you are developing a website, a customer portal or an online application, the development will comprise of a number of page types. Typically for larger projects that cater for multiple audience classes  - such as a customer portal - there may be between eight and twelve page types . Prior to doing the detailed design of these page types, it is important to create wire frames or concept pages that identify the types of objects that will appear on each page type and their relative weighting. These page types and wire frames should be approved by all relevant stakeholders prior to the commencement of the detailed on-screen design phase.

In Taten’s experience, it is not only much more cost effective to have wire frames designed and approved, but it is also ensures that the relevant stakeholders focus on outcomes first and the aesthetic factors later on in the process.

Sample interface design

Once the page wire frames have been designed, it is much easier for the graphic design team to focus on creating output that will ensure that it meets the intended purpose. Depending on budget constraints, typically sample interface design will focus on the key pages such as the portal page or home page. All page types should go thorough a sample interface design phase.

Template development

Once the sample interfaces are created, the templates will be developed according to the visual standards defined by the sample interfaces as well taking into consideration the number and types of web browsers that need to be supported.

Software build

Once the templates are built, then the project goes into the actual build phase. If the site is being hosted on non Taten infrastructure, then once some sample content has been loaded and the templates approved, the site is then loaded on to the customer’s hosting environment.

Content load

The content is then loaded. To minimise the project development time, it is preferable to have content in its final form prior to being loaded into the content management system as this task can occur in parallel to the other development tasks. The content loading task should also include the internal and external hyper-linking of content. Hyper-linking of content is one of the parameters used by search engines to rank the relevance of content.

User acceptance testing

Prior to launch, the site should be tested and sign off received from all the relevant stakeholders. If sign off is required from a legal and compliance team, then these resources should be appropriately scoped and resource availability planned well in advance to prevent unnecessary delays.

Launch

Taten strongly recommends any new software development - a customer portal, online application -  be “soft launched” before a public launch. This soft launch ensures that the capacity and integrity of the infrastructure is tested, the relevant staff are made aware of the response processes that may need to be implemented, as well as ensuring the search engines have had time to index the new content and any web address changes have had an opportunity to propagate their way around the internet.

Measure and analysis

Once a website is launched it should be the subject of continuous monitoring and review to ensure that not only are the original objectives being met, but that the content and structure of the site is supporting the audience needs.

Change requests

If changes are required, then relevant sections should be re-designed and implemented as quickly as possible. One of the key advantages of the online environment is the rate at which changes can be made.