This cost model is intended to provide sufficient detail to establish a project budget. The budget will be revised at the end of the vendor functional analysis activities discovery process , where more detail about the requirements is known in order to gain a firm price or potentially a fixed pricing arrangement for the approved enhancements.
The challenge for management is to decide which initiatives will take the company successfully forward into the new age and to determine which initiatives underway deserve continued support.
This software evaluation process provides management with a sound proposal to debate. The debate centres around making an informed decision on which solution provides the best functional fit taking into account the cost of the options assessed and the effect product short falls will potentially have on realising the project benefits. For example, the sample evaluation in Figure 9 illustrates how the most expensive package can be the best solution, when it resolves a greater number of process issues that have a direct impact on the benefits model.
In addition to providing a decision-making framework for selecting the most appropriate solution, this collaborative software evaluation process provides many soft benefits that will directly lead to a successful implementation. Finally, the reports produced during the evaluation provide a full audit trail that would pass any governance process. In a recent project conducted the project recommendation passed all programme office audits conducted including third party business consultancies two , the internal auditor and the legal probity auditor.
Stephan Streitberger is Managing Director of designer DATA, he is a business strategist and specialises in facilitating cross functional system solutions. Menu Menu. With many new business projects looking to buy or rent a solution rather than build one, it is worth considering: What makes an effective tender process?
What artefacts are prepared to select commercial software? Will it deliver an auditable process that fulfils all corporate governance rules? Figure 1: Indicative Project Plan The activity duration ranges, outlined above, allow for variations in project scope, i.
Figure 2: Tender Process The key benefits of this tender process relate to stakeholder ownership, insight into how the solution will improve the business process and the benefits that will be realised through those improvements.
Requirements Approach A facilitated workshop approach is used to prepare the high-level process and data requirements. Figure 3: Workshop Programme Business models are used to brainstorm and test common understanding of the processes conducted and data used by the different stakeholders.
Highlight Mandatory Criteria [green] — Used sparingly to identify fundamental criteria, e. Highlight Differentiating Criteria [yellow] — Critical, important and possibly desirable requirements that will be used as evaluation hurdles. Data: Data model and associated requirements.
Non-functional: Features, usability, reliability, performance and standards. Interfaces: System integration architecture data map. Assessment criteria: 50 — 80 functional criteria derived from the business requirements. Test data: Scenario-based process test cases. Assessment Method The software evaluation activity involves inviting a number of commercial software vendors to present their software product s against the requirements and assessment criteria.
The steps undertaken during the demonstrations include: Viewing the software in action during the vendor product demonstration and clarifying any concerns. Rating the capability demonstrated against the criteria by determining the degree of fit 0 — 3. Figure 4: Simple Scoring Recording key conclusions to supplement the argument for justifying the recommendations, for example: — Pros: A capability that the assessors felt confident about, e.
Figure 5: Sample Demo Agenda The vendor demonstrations are typically scheduled over single week. Figure 6: Scorecard Summary Once the overall score is known and major discrepancies considered, the panel is asked to list the headline strengths and weaknesses they identified during the evaluation.
What are the primary features of the solution that will significantly improve the way we do business, i. How or why will they lead to improvement? What concerns did the product descriptions raise or where does the uncertainty lie? The nitty-gritty: Test group participants scored each requirement between 1 and 5, with 1 equaling not important and 5 equaling most important. Then participants would also use the same scoring system to rate how well each tool within the software implemented the given requirements.
That rating would be multiplied by the weight to achieve a final score. At this point, you should have two or maybe three possibilities to pilot. A short pilot period gives you the opportunity to run a real-world situation through the software.
Your software evaluation work is done when it comes to software selection anyway. Still unsure? Talk to your test group and anyone else you asked to participate in your evaluation process. Have these MVPs rank your remaining options. Try to investigate beyond the average rank.
This is where weighted scoring can be especially valuable in driving the conversation. Last but definitely not least, listen to your gut.
Jacob Bodnar VP of Operations. Step 1: Discover what your learners aka end users need First and foremost, be sure to pick the brains of your users—i. Step 2: Pinpoint your must-haves Translate the problems and needs you uncovered in the discovery phase into tangible requirements. For our PM software evaluation, we developed a comprehensive spreadsheet that included: Giving each of our requirements a brief description that explained what we wanted the software to do.
The more relevant the feature, the greater the weight. The collective weight of all the features should sum up to Then score each tool on its individual features, on a scale of 1 to 5, and use this formula to generate a weighted score:. Do this for each tool to see how the final scores compare. Selecting the right vendor is just as important as selecting a tool with robust technical capabilities. Here are some criteria on which you can evaluate the vendor:. FAQ: How can I do effective vendor research?
Answer: There are many ways of doing vendor research. You can visit their website, read case studies, and refer to third-party websites to read unbiased vendor reviews. If you are aware of someone who uses the product, you can ask for their feedback on the vendor.
Additionally, you can refer to news sources to check if the vendor has been involved in any data security breaches or overcharging. Answer: The TCO will vary based on the initial setup—on-premise deployment usually involves higher upfront investment than SaaS. It will also vary based on licensing and subscription, maintenance and support, data migration, and hardware costs. Either way, the more perspectives you have, the better.
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