Requirements Analysis
Business requirements are to software selection as foundations are to a building. Get them wrong and there are always problems! Wayferry’s process is designed to discover all significant business requirements, including those you don’t know you need.
Note that business requirements describe WHAT the software must deliver. Software requirements describe HOW the software will be configured, and are part of the implementation, not the selection.
Develop requirements. We add requirements from our extensive library to the evaluation to meet the deliverables identified in Stage 1. This library shaves weeks off developing requirements.
Software research. We use our extensive knowledge of the market to identify software product candidates that could potentially meet the needs.
Reverse engineering is how we discover significant requirements you don't know you need. If not discovered during analysis, these requirements will be found later in the project where they cause delays, cost increases and business disruption on going live. (See blog article.)
Weight requirements. For each requirement, we capture who wants it, how important it is to them, why they want it, and who will test it before the software goes into production.
Software Evaluation
Solicit vendor input. Your weighted requirements are used to create an RFP, and vendors are invited to respond online. Where appropriate, we ask the software publisher to nominate a suitable implementation vendor who will respond to the RFP.
Gap analysis. The proprietary Wayferry Navigator captures vendor responses to your weighted requirements in the RFP. It automatically computes the gap analysis which measures how well potential software products meet your particular requirements.
Rank software. Wayferry's Navigator ranks potential software products by how well they meet your particular requirements. The best fit products rise to the top of the list.
Scope check. No system does everything, and all systems have edges. Wayferry will verify that your requirements match software available on the market. We help you understand where the functional edges of the new software are located, and what functionality better belongs in other systems that will interface to the new software.
Software Selection
Shortlist. We facilitate your team selecting two or three software products for demonstration.
Demo script. In collaboration with your team, Wayferry designs the demo script to verify your showstopper requirements are met.
Software demos. We work with you and the vendors to schedule demos. We attend the demos with you and keep the vendors on track. We remind vendors that this is a technical demonstration and not a sales presentation.
Demo feedback. We collect and summarize demo feedback returned by your team.
Provisional selection. The analysis makes the software selection, and the demo confirms that selection. Based on the gap analysis and demo feedback, we facilitate your provisional software selection decision.
Set expectations. No software is perfect. The RFP response of the selected software defines what you can expect from that software.
Stage output
User buy-in. Capturing user names and details on requirements will have created and nurtured user buy-in. Explaining the functionality available from modern software will have built excitement amongst users.
Gap analysis. Vendors will have responded to the RFP using the Wayferry Navigator, which automatically calculates product fit scores. You will have measured and ranked potential software products by how well they meet your particular requirements.
Scope checked. No software is perfect and you will know how well your needs are met by the software products evaluated. If necessary, the scope of the requirements will have been adjusted to match available software.
Provisional selection. You will have provisionally selected the software based on how well it meets your requirements.
Expectations will be aligned with what the provisionally selected software can deliver.
ERP & enterprise software purchasing. An overview of the process.
Business alignment. Align the new software with the business vision & strategy.
Software selection. Choose the software that best fits your particular needs.
Software purchase. Develop SOW, negotiate contracts.
Implementation success management. Use the requirements analysis to reduce risks and accelerate the implementation.
Software failure gallery. Examples of enterprise acquisitions that have gone wrong. You don’t want to go here.
The 5 costs of poor software purchasing. See where and why taking short cuts costs far more than it saves.
Pains from new software. See the business, technical and personal pains you will experience when a project goes wrong.
A note on scope creep
When buying software, there can be no scope creep. What is called scope creep is actually an inadequate requirements analysis.
An adequate requirements analysis uses reverse engineering techniques to identify all significant requirements, which reduces the risk of implementations taking longer than planned.