Approach

A common problem with software projects is that during the course of the project, critical factors like project scope, business objectives, stakeholder participation, schedule, and user requirements change. It’s inevitable. Inexperienced project teams and commonly used methodologies are ill equipped and the result is over-budget projects, poor quality deliverables, and systems that don’t meet user expectations.

Shift takes a pragmatic approach to developing IT solutions, designed to mitigate how changes impact a projects success. Our teams practice a development methodology on each project that we call the Shift Agile Approach.

Based upon the increasingly popular agile methodologies of Extreme Programming (“XP”) and Feature-Driven Development (“FDD”), our team developed approach focuses on the following technical principles:

Our Focus:

Short, iterative development cycles
Modular design and architecture
Flexible, but controlled requirements
Automated system testing
Analyst and client user testing
Frequent integration and deployment

The Shift Agile Approach  is more than just a technical methodology. The project manager and client work together to ensure that risks, misunderstood requirements and divergent business expectations are minimized by letting users participate in the creation, prioritization, design, and testing of key features of the system. In this manner, our approach helps to provide direct accountability for the project team.

By incorporating these techniques and adhering to a rigid project management curriculum of planning, tracking, and control, the project can also achieve the business objectives:

Our Objectives:

Cost control
Adhere to schedule milestones
Client control over scope and specifications
High quality/ low defect software
User satisfaction