Being the client of a software development firm is no easy task. There are many ways that a firm might go about developing software, some good, some bad. All of them can be confusing to even the most technical and savvy of clients. It is no wonder that the Scrum Alliance has a Certified Product Owner certification for those working with firms that practice Scrum (one of the agile development frameworks). It takes patience, practice, and time, to make your way up the learning curve.
Projects managed using Scrum are very different than traditionally managed projects. In the past, you would start by writing a book of requirements. Why a book? Well, once you got started you couldn’t change anything, so you had better be as detailed as possible in the beginning, because changes cost big money and took a lot of time. Once the book was ready you would move into a design phase, where the development team would figure out how to create an application from your requirements. When that was finished, the team would start developing. Months (or years later) when the team finished, you’d get a crack at the application. Not what you wanted? Uh oh, that’s going to be an issue. For the sake of brevity though, let’s say that the app was exactly what you wanted. That’s when you would move into maintenance mode.
Scrum is not like this. However, we’ll get into that later.
If you are considering embarking on a software project where Scrum will be used, whether the developers are inside of your company or you are hiring a firm, what do you do? What can you expect, and what will be expected of you? How will the process work? It is these questions and more that I will work to answer in this series of blog posts I call, “How to Be a Client.”
Other Posts That Might Interest You
