Soft Side of IT

 
Last post, I brought up the a basic problem with confusions that come up for anyone that has dealt with IT.

So what can we do to make sure IT understand what we want?

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Here are 3 essentials to do to cope with this:

Meetings
Yes, I said it … Meetings has some value. IT people think differently than operations & they think differently than finance … Actually they all have different languages with millions of acronyms.

The meetings can visualize the problem or at least picturing the solutions. Just make sure the details, confusions & decisions are writen down, so it can apply to …

Requirements & Specifications
Here is why we split out requirements & specification.

• Requirements is to describe what users needs, wants & limitations.
• Specifications are the list of to dos & the details of the design (It’s similar assignment sheet that we got in college for project, just longer & more details.)

Many times we forget about this & annoyed that we have to write 2 documents … Then we setup to be upset on a result.

Change Request
When application can be seen, tons of suggestions start flowing in. This is where IT would put all the suggestion into one bucket & put into a change request, while ask for more $$$ & approval for the unexpected work.

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NOTE: These are not best practices, these are just case where a freelancer or small business development shop would face to make sure their customer get what they want. Larger companies will have more complex & detail processes. 

If anyone has use other ways to handle of the issue.
Please reply through e-mail or comments.