How to prevent from failures of Software Projects?

Introduction

One of the main causes of rising software product and service costs is the failure of software projects. There is sufficient proof of past and present project failures. Any organization must use the proceeds from successful projects to offset the expense of unsuccessful programs. These factors make software still out of reach for small and medium-sized businesses, having a substantial impact on both social and economic factors. In addition, software project failures can result in losses ranging from financial to personal. Therefore, it's crucial to pinpoint the many causes of software project failures. If these causes are anticipated, steps can be taken throughout project development to lower the likelihood of failure.

Do Software Projects Fail Frequently?

Only 16.2% of the 8,380 software projects included in the Standish Report's survey of 365 respondents turned out to be "perfect projects." According to their analysis, 31.1% of projects had total failures, while others had project management issues.
The same McKinsey research claims that software initiatives often only deliver 83% of their projected value. Additionally, software projects often ran 33% and 66% beyond budget and schedule estimates, respectively. In other words, a project that was supposed to be finished in three months would typically take four. The real cost of the project would be $33,200 if the projected cost was $20,000.

ANALYSIS OF SUCCESSFUL AND UNSUCCESSFUL SOFTWARE PROJECTS

Software engineering's main goal is to create programs with predetermined functionality and;

Within Time, Budget, and Good Quality, as well as.
Any software development endeavor that meets the aforementioned requirements is deemed successful.
Any software project that is planned to offer initially-approved functionality, as well as one that easily satisfies the stakeholders and is accepted and mainly used by the end users after deployment, may be considered a successful software project. So any project intended to assist an organization's operations by utilizing information technology resources and failing to produce the desired results within the initially allotted budget and timeline is referred to as a software project failure.

Identifying the typical causes of software project failure and classifying them

Frequently, it is simple to determine whether a software project was successful or unsuccessful. However, it might be difficult to pinpoint and comprehend the true causes of project failure. For instance, the first thing to consider is "Why?" If the provided system did not meet the client's or user's needs.

Was it as a result of the development team's poor work? Alternately, maybe the prerequisites weren't used or collected correctly. Or, perhaps the individuals in charge of providing the needs made mistakes? Or

Was it another thing?

It is also more difficult to pinpoint the precise cause of project failure and offer alternatives because software development is a people-intensive profession. A software project failing is typically caused by a number of causes.

Areas or sources that the project could fail for include:

It is clear from the aforementioned comments that there are a number of potential locations or drivers of project failure. Below are some of the examined causes of software project failure that have been listed and explored:

Project sources include:

•  people sources,
• Lack of User Training
• Client Conflicts and Politics
•  Technology sources,
• Wrong Technology selection. 
• Technology was either too new or did not function properly.
•  Use of immature technology

•  Process sources, 
• Lack of Communications
• Lack of User Involvement
• Organizational sources, 
• Poor communication among customers, developers, and users
•  Reasons Related to Human Resource
•  Insufficient Resources
• Management sources,
• Poor reporting of the project's status
•  Insufficient involvement of Senior management
•  Insufficient staff/team Size
•  Business sources.
• Commercial pressures

six ways to make a software project successful

HAVE A PLAN

        Everyone will be aware of their responsibilities throughout the project if proper preparation has been done. You should decide on the project strategy and approach that will help you reach your final objective before you start working. Spend some time choosing the development tools you'll employ throughout the procedure and determining the technological framework that will underpin your product

Make certain you have everything listed below:

• Sprint strategies with distinct benchmarks
• Framework for the application Code reviews
• Automated evaluation
• Task and bug tracking

HAVE CLEAR COMMUNICATION

        At the beginning of a project, clear communication is crucial. You, as the client, should be very clear about the specifications and goals you have for your product. By expressing your needs, you may be confident that the development team will create exactly what you request. To make sure that everyone is on the same page, define your scope of work in writing. You'll have a better chance of producing a successful software project if you communicate well.  The foundation of a successful software project is clear and consistent agreement, which ultimately helps to avoid confusion, delays, and blunders. No matter what stage the project is in, communication is crucial. There should be a specific communication channel for understanding issues, successes, or continuous project updates (i.e. Slack, Skype, Email, etc.).

FOCUS ON YOUR DESIGN

        The UX designers should provide a thorough design document that details the strategies and resources that support the objectives of your product during the design phase. The paper should subsequently be reviewed by software engineers to make any necessary technical corrections. The design serves as the construction's manual. Finding the ideal design could need a few test runs. This is why it's crucial for the development process to include testing and enhancement phases. The user experience should be given top priority by your top-notch UX design team. For creating user flow mock-ups, they would require some technical tools like wireframing and prototyping software.

PERFORM A FINAL AND POST-RELEASE REVIEW

            Don't wait until the last minute to plan your release. You should test your system with setup and data that are as similar to production as possible at the start of the project.  After you've done all of this and finished your final acceptance tests, deployment is the following step. Depending on the particular needs of your project, the deployment procedure is tailored. The deployment paperwork needs to be checked over, verified, and approved by your operations team. Then, after the product has been released, you should evaluate and consider what worked and what didn't during the project's lifecycle. This will enable your team to modify performance for the subsequent project.

FOLLOW BEST PRACTICES FOR SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT

        Your team must adhere to best practices for software development. The coding standards should be followed by the development team. Another crucial element is source control, which gives you the ability to govern code modifications and serve as a central repository for your code.

Continuous Delivery ( and Continuous Integration (CI) are some other contemporary development techniques (CD). CI is a process designed to deliver routine updates and bug fixes to users as rapidly as possible. Automated testing is heavily used to verify the changes made during the process. By enabling you to distribute changes to your clients, CD expands the CI process.

The software development team should conduct a code review before launching your application. You will find any faults and defects during the crucial code review phase of your software project. Software engineers must follow best practices, and code review makes sure that everyone on the team has evaluated the code.

Reduce risk and act swiftly to fix problems.

Any project carries some level of risk. The secret to managing software projects successfully is foreseeing future risks, as this reduces the amount of time and money needed to mitigate them. Consider the risk that can be present whenever you describe a requirement, establish a milestone, or define a task. Examples of such risks include incomplete designs, a lack of buy-in, insufficient data, and software flaws.

After that, consider how you and the teams you oversee will handle each risk. Consider the risk's importance level as well; for instance, a mistake in the user interface's color is probably less dangerous than a mistake in the database's data. Deal with problems as soon as they arise.

Summary

To deliver software projects on schedule and under budget, a solid software development lifecycle (SDLC) procedure must be in place. Your job will be made much easier as you build each project if you follow a procedure and have template usage summaries, use cases, and specification documents ready. Utilize an iterative development process that keeps you and the project in the user's line of sight at all times and enables frequent feedback from the user. Your software projects will be successful if you define your application's components up front, before you start developing.