Almost all companies have people with a "1000 foot" view of what's required to use IT in the business. They process the invoices, make payroll happen. But what happens when you need a more strategic, "10,000 or 30,000 foot" view? We've "been there, done that." We are good at seeing the bigger picture. We can help you recover from or, better yet, avoid dead ends.

Over the last years, we have frequently been asked to help with a recurring issue. Individuals and workgroups develop solutions to assist in their daily work. These solutions never make it to IT's inventory. As a result IT does not consider such in migration decisions. Then -WHAMO! - the migration happens and folks can't do their job.. The people who developed these solutions did not do even basic technical documentation and have "moved on." There is no expertise in the organization to address this "black hole." We can step in and help.

Now, AI is becoming part of the mix. The Wall Street Journal is the "iceberg" of the business world. What do I mean? By the time WSJ does a story on an issue, it is already bigger than WSJ reports. Recently, articles on "Technical Debt," "Legacy Tech" (remember COBOL and Y2K?), and the use of outside software apps appeared. And AI is inserting bugs into code being upgraded from legacy languages.

IT PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Our project management services include project planning, resource allocation, and risk management.

BOEING has had its share of recent issues. Although most software is not as complex as an airplane, it is every bit as important to your company. "You can't effect change if you can't even assess what the situation is and figure out what needs to be fixed, let alone put together a plan to fix it."

The Gartner Group has estimated that more than half of ERP projects fail.

Other groups report that 9 out of 10 projects fail to deliver measurable ROI.

The Wall Street Journal's Christopher Mims published an article on "technical debt." "This technical debt would require $1.52 trillion to fix, and costs the U.S. $2.41 trillion a year in cybersecurity and operational failures, failed development projects, and maintenance of outdated systems...."

We start with 2 basic questions: is it REALLY an IT issue, and can/should we tackle it?

WE HELP YOU RESOLVE BUSINESS ISSUES.

The best place to start any project is identifying priorities. A great way to start is using the old but well proven tool named the "Eisenhower Box" (Avoid the "Urgency Trap" with the Eisenhower Matrix) to identify and prioritize the resolution of issues. On any project, we focus on user feedback, prototyping, and reworking the prototype to achieve the desired result.

Whether you call them specifications or user stories (https://www.mountaingoatsoftware.com/agile/user-stories ), any successful project requires a good understanding of the expected outcome.

Most of us that have been around a while cut our teeth on Waterfall. Many are still there. This methodology works well when we are developing accounting and other less dynamic apps.. As a result, we can help you manage waterfall projects with new tools and techniques.

Prefer Agile? Let us help get you there. The greatest benefit of Agile? Minimizing your odds of putting in lots of work and ending up with an inappropriate solution. Much like TQM in the manufacturing world, by checking as you go, design issues are caught early and corrected. User input is incorporated in the right amount at the right time. Effort spent to develop faulty documentation is minimized.

Agile has several flavors - SCRUM, XP, FDD - and "sprinkles" to help fit your situation - for example, using a Kanban board with SCRUM, resulting in processes affectionately called SCRUMBan or KanSCRUM. or inserting TDD into the process.

Because there is no one "correct" way to use Agile, let us help you implement a working tool, whether strictly orthodox or core with addons.

About Us

How Our Experience Helps

mitigating risk by reducing unintended consequences of your decisions
managing expectations using iterative analysis - "checking as you go"
identifying counterfactuals to identify bad things you prevented from happening
discovering and correcting root causes, not vague symptoms
reviewing decisions by people who have worked in the industry from punch cards to The Cloud
adopting traceablility to account for "the devil" in "the details"

Business Analysis plus Project Management Methodologies

platform "agnostic" analysis
software project remediation
Agile (primarily SCRUM)
migrating from waterfall to Agile/SCRUM
rebooting an ineffective Agile/SCRUM process
other iterative processes
waterfall/phased waterfall
spiral
Rational Unified Process (RUP)

Application Development & Support

implementing new COTS apps
converting from one COTS app to another
"upversioning" Office/Office 365 apps (i.e, converting worksheets to tables to allow logical naming rather than positional naming)
moving legacy apps to current platforms
remote support of VB- and VBA-based apps
new Office/Office 365 development (primarily Access and Excel prototypes)
addons to CRM/ERP solutions
SQL Server
Oracle/MySQL/nosql
ETL processes development

Welcome to the Software Solutions Group of the heartland

We are updating our site so please check back in.

WE ASK BETTER QUESTIONS SO YOU GET BETTER SOLUTIONS

IT PROJECT MANAGEMENT

WE HELP YOU RESOLVE BUSINESS ISSUES.

About Us

How Our Experience Helps

Business Analysis plus Project Management Methodologies

Application Development & Support

"Special software for specific situations."

Drop us a request and we'll schedule a phone call!

SoftwareSolutions.Group