Current State Assessment
Business improvement begins with assessment of the current state. A solid understanding of how core operational processes are actually functioning within the business is necessary before any change that will make a difference can be designed. Assessments highlight areas where the organization presents challenges, which might lie in its structure, linkages, or culture, and help define criteria to guide the design process.
Future State Design
The Future State is where we are trying to get to. It is often not fully defined and can actually shift while we are trudging through the Transition State. The Future State is supposed to be better than the Current State in terms of performance
Gap Analysis
Gap analysis is used to compare where you are against where you would like to be. This helps you identify the gaps between these two states, and come up with an action plan to close them. Basically, it helps you find solutions to issues that are holding you back from growing as a business. It can be performed on:
- A strategic level – comparing the condition of your business with that of the industry
- Operational level – comparing the current state of your business performance with the state you desire
Requirements Gathering and Documentation
Requirements are a key component of any project. They help a project team define the goals and scope of the work they will be doing, and they provide objective ways to measure the project’s success. The functional requirements for a project are defined and developed after the project’s business requirements have been established.
- Mergers and acquisitions
- Change management
- Private equity
- Performance improvement
- Customer loyalty and insights
- Growth strategy
- Organizational effectiveness
- Operational excellence
- Compliance
- Information technology
Advantages of Having Good Requirements
| Reduce Project failure | Structured explanation of a business process or method defined early in the life cycle helps reduce project failures that occur due to misaligned or misrepresented requirements leading to failure of user expectations. |
| Connects to broader business goals | Well-defined business requirements help lay out a project charter, a critical step in executing business strategy or business goals, and to take it to the next logical step of developing it into an IT system. This helps monitoring overall project health and provides for positive traction with key project stakeholders including sponsors. |
| Consensus creation and collaboration | The benefit of a structured format typical of business requirements documentation helps create positive consensus and better collaboration where the business stakeholder group might be a large cross-functional team, distributed geographically. |
| Saves costs | Good quality of business requirements when captured early on not only improves success of a project but also save overall costs associated with change requests, and related investments in training, infrastructure, etc. |
Business Requirements
for a project are a series of needs that must be fulfilled to achieve a high-level objective. For example, if a company’s objective is to upgrade its manual payroll process by switching to an automated payroll process, the business requirements for the project might be described as, “implement a computerized system that reduces errors and increases efficiency by calculating employees’ wages, withholding required deductions and paying the employee the amount she is owed.” Clear business requirements help ensure that the end result of a project fulfills the stakeholders’ needs.
Functional Requirements
are a detailed breakdown that explains how the outcome of a project will operate to meet the specified business requirements. For example, If a company’s business requirement is to automate its payroll system, functional requirements will address such issues as how many employees the system must accommodate; whether they are hourly, salaried or both; what a pay period is; what states’ tax withholding regulations must be followed in addition to federal requirements and the like. It often include a list of the steps that each user will take in the new system. For a payroll system, such a list will be created for an hourly employee, a salaried employee and a payroll specialist.
Process Flow Diagram and Analysis
Businesses are a collection of linked tasks that find their end in the delivery of a service or product to a client. The business process can also be viewed as a set of activities and tasks that, once completed, will accomplish an organizational goal. Summit works with its clients to build new and redefine old and inefficient business processes
A business process flow is a way of visualizing and documenting the steps in a business process. Flow charts document inputs or requests for information, products, or any other deliverable; the procedural steps to satisfy that request; and the output, or deliverable, that is generated by the input.
A process flow diagram is a picture of the separate steps of a process in sequential order. It is a generic tool that can be adapted for a wide variety of purposes and can be used to describe various processes, such as a manufacturing process, an administrative or service process, or a project plan. It’s a common process and quality analysis tool.
Prototyping
Prototyping is an experimental process where design teams implement ideas into tangible forms from paper to digital. Teams build prototypes of varying degrees of fidelity to capture design concepts and test on users. With prototypes, you can refine and validate your designs so your brand can release the right products.
User Acceptance Testing
User acceptance test (UAT) is a process that confirms that the output of a project meets the business needs and requirements. In technology projects User acceptance testing (UAT) is the last phase of the software testing process. During UAT, actual software users test the software to make sure it can handle required tasks in real-world scenarios, according to specifications
Risk Management
Risk management should be embedded within the culture of the organization so that everyone is focused on managing and optimizing risk. Summit works with organizations to help them better understand their risk exposure.