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Finding a development partner that fits your business and your needs can be a time-intensive process. You and your stakeholders work hard to create the best chance for success and the least chance for failure.
With so much risk and accountability on your shoulders, it’s critical to work with a software development partner in the same arena, working just as hard to make the business successful. You should expect their software development partner to deliver more than functional software.
Direct Line of Communication
Having a direct line of communication to the designers and developers doing the work reduces several risks throughout the build process.
Meeting weekly helps teams build trust as each person brings their own updates, questions, and recommendations to move the work forward. This type of “us against the problem” mindset allows everyone to work efficiently toward the same outcome.
Extension of Your Team
Great partners actively work to understand your company and industry so they can make thoughtful decisions that differentiate your product and business. Their care and attention to detail shine through in their work and how they get there.
Being an extension of your team means weighing both short-term and long-term outcomes with decisions and working hard to make a product that's valuable, solid, and maintainable.
A great partner can engage in the work around the product and features. That could include providing their design, technical, and delivery leadership in managing costs, staffing, change management, long-term maintenance, etc. Engaging in this way requires an understanding of your business, the goals of the project, and how to build great products.
Hands-On With Working Software
Product owners can expect to have access to the product from early development through testing for launch. Getting into the product early and often keeps focus on what’s most important and valuable. It’s common to make small tweaks once you start interacting with the product. Your dev partner should be side by side with you, bringing a critical eye to the work being delivered and how it meets the desired outcomes.
Similarly, your software partner should make the process understandable from start to finish. They bring you all the information about potential tradeoffs so you can make the right choices for your business. At any time, you have all the info to speak to the work that’s been done, what the focus is now, and when the next milestone will be reached.
Process Made For You
Software development partners can explain the tools and processes (like AI tools and agile practices) that help them build great products efficiently. Teams can layer on practices that make these gains work for your team and business. This may include tools for daily communication, file sharing and storage, or even options for managing the backlog of work together.
What is equally important in a partnership is knowing where you shouldn't over-invest. This can apply to the process itself, like adjusting the frequency or size of team meetings. Additionally, your partner should be thoughtful abpit what is the right amount of design and tech to solve the problem, and the right questions to pull you, the product owner, into.
Expect Your Software Development Partner to:
- Create a direct line of communication with the people doing the work
- Understand your business and how/why you’re differentiated in your industry
- Make decisions that are right for your business in the long term
- Roll up their sleeves with you, share accountability of making sure the product achieves the desired outcomes
- Facilitate a process of planning, communication, and review that works for you and your team
- Be responsive to the needs you have for reporting out to stakeholders and leaders
- Make sense of design, development, and delivery and how it applies to your unique problem and/or business
At the end of the day, how your software development partner engages in the work is just as important, maybe more, than what they deliver. They should work to improve your business, not just deliver a great product.
Is your software development partner working for you?
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