These five strategies will improve your software development process and help you and your company get great results.
Building quality software successfully is a complex process filled with many challenges. Every developer and development team can become overwhelmed by these challenges. That is why it is crucial to address them promptly and effectively to reduce their impact on the final product.
If you want to develop a superior software product, you should have an efficient plan for every stage of the software development process. Inadequately planned and defective process may compromise the product quality and result in significant delays. Finding and implementing the best strategies to improve your software development will ensure the successful delivery of a software product and guarantee that it’s done within budget, time, and scope.
This article will cover practical steps to help you and your team improve the software development process and optimize your work. Check out five strategies that every developer and development team should apply in their work.
Optimize Your Workflow
The development workflow is the process by which a software team manages production and includes all stages of the software development life cycle – planning, development, testing, deployment, and iteration.
Creating a clear and efficient workflow will help you achieve great results with less effort. Generally, an efficient workflow should strike a balance between speed and quality, reduce costs and increase the team’s productivity. A streamlined workflow will keep the whole team on track and enable them to operate at their peak.
But have patients, successful workflow optimization takes time and is perfected through trial and error.
Utilize Modern Development Tools and Methodologies
Making use of the right tools and methodologies is essential. Countless tools are available on the market, and they all have the same purpose – to help you improve your workflow efficiency.
You can implement project management methodologies like Agile, Scrum, or Kanban. They can help you efficiently complete your project and increase productivity. Also, there are numerous software development tools that come in the form of linkers, compilers, code editors, GUI designers, assemblers, debuggers, and performance analysis tools. They all perform a specific role in the software development lifecycle and help you facilitate and accelerate the different phases of software development.
Here are some examples:
- Bug tracking tools: ClickUp, BackLog and MantisBT, Marker.io
- Code management tools: Assembla, IntelliJ, GitHub, GitLab, Mercurial, Kiuwan, Storm
- Code searching tools such as The Silver Searcher, Codase
- Project management tools like Monday.com, Trello, Jira, Asana, Wrike
- Team collaboration tools like Slack, Trello, ClickUp, Microsoft Teams
- Time tracking tools like Hubstaff or Jibble
Choose tools depending on the type of project you work on. Whatever you choose, remember they will make your life easier and improve your project outcome. (even if you are not an expert in coding).
Have a Clear Definition of Done
DoD (definition of done) is a set of criteria that need to be met for an aspect of the project or a task to be considered complete. Both in terms of quality and functionality. Explicit completion criteria should be defined from the start, and it should be a collaborative effort between the development team and the stakeholders. In that way, the whole team will be aligned and follow the same objectives.
In essence, the definition of done is a checklist of all the work that team needs to do before indicating the product increment as “done” or releasable.
How will you measure it?
The specific criteria can vary depending on the team and the project. However, a typical checklist would include:
- Unit tests written and done
- Code review completed
- Peer review completed
- Acceptance criteria met
- Functional tests passed
- Non-Functional requirements met
- User story demonstrated and accepted by Product Owner
Groom Your Backlog
Cleaning your backlog is vital for keeping the project organized. Your backlog will keep growing if you are not actively shaping it. A large backlog will lead to frustration and slow the whole process.
What can you do?
- Prioritize Important Items
- Delete Low-Value Items
- Merge the Similar Items
Well-managed backlog comes with many benefits. It helps your team deliver features faster and keeps the project moving forward more efficiently.
Collaborate with Team Members
Effective team collaboration is essential for successful software development projects. Whether you are working on a software project by yourself or as part of a team, working together towards a common goal and sharing high-level skills will ensure that the whole process goes smoothly, from inception to delivery.
Working as a team has many benefits. When team members know their role and responsibility and encourage each other, efficiency and success are inevitable. It also:
- Accelerate product development
- Boosts productivity and motivation
- Builds a sense of community
- Drives Creativity and Innovation
- Facilitates Transparency
- Increases Code Quality
- Instills Accountability
- Offers alternative viewpoints,
- Reduces Costs
- Reduces stress
- Saves time
Don’t forget, if you want to achieve excellent performance and build a fantastic product, you must be able to cooperate with your teammates successfully.
Conclusion
Every software development process aims to create a high-quality product that meets project requirements. Following and implementing these five strategies will optimize your software development process and increase the chances of building a top-quality product.
The more streamlined and efficient the development process is, the better you can predict its time to market and prevent coding and other development mistakes.
About Cosmic Development
At Cosmic Development, we believe great things happen when passion and talent combine. In our decade-long existence, we have proven that with proper planning and strategy, and with the help of technology and exemplary leadership, we can achieve excellent team productivity and efficiency and offer high-quality software solutions to our clients.
Be a part of our dedicated software development team and work on exciting projects. We’ll provide you with an environment that will let you thrive. We offer great workplace culture, perks, and excellent work-life balance. Check out our most recent job openings and apply.
