IT projects can be formulated and implemented almost always and everywhere. The development of the information sphere has already reached a level where there is no need to “fantasize” what and how to do. In addition, if the processes of informatization at the enterprise have begun, then there will be no opportunity to stop there.
The better things are going on at the enterprise, the more complex information tasks he has to set and solve. Due to many factors, a natural need arises for solving related IT problems.
The well-established infrastructure of the company determines the need for protection: from malicious code, from cyber threats, from theft of confidential information, from the behavior of employees seeking to harm the company. In fact, the development of the company's IT project leads to the need to implement other, related projects, the meaning of which is clearly defined, but the solution is determined by the specific situation.
The essence and objectivity of the IT project
It is generally accepted that a business or company is a certain infrastructure. First of all, these are:
- manufacturing equipment, computers, network, sites and similar resources;
- software;
- technical and organizational documentation;
- legislation and own regulations;
- staff.
Regardless of whether the creation of the enterprise involved the development of its own IT project or the evaluation of IT projects made it possible to choose the one already created, further work will be formed in three directions:
- software development (development);
- implementation of information systems;
- infrastructure and organizational projects.
These three areas determine the prevailing idea of ​​the types into which it is customary to divide IT projects. This is not a very clear definition, but most experts adhere to it.
However, business leaders, experts and theorists of the infosphere are objectively convinced that without software and hardware there is no business, no government, or effective social relations.
Even before the advent of computer technology, objective reality clearly defined: information is the essence of everything that lives (exists) and develops. The result for which it is developed depends on how this development is reflected in a real project.
The financial side of the project
Analysis and evaluation of IT projects, both completed (on the fact of costs) and prepared (on the proposed investments) indicate a high cost, but not always an adequate return on implementation. The risks of wasting significant funds are very high.
The real economic efficiency from the implementation of most IT projects is far from being confirmed in all cases. Practice indicates a large percentage of unsuccessful implementations.
Indeed, any design in the IT field requires the participation of skilled labor, expensive equipment, time to understand the scope and, most importantly, the principles of its development. All areas of application are unique. You can produce costumes and shoes in series, but a person who cares about his health and appearance always chooses a personal master.
The IT project manager is an important part of any project. Actually, his team, too, but this is less critical. The result of the team’s work is an optionally completed “working” project in reality. It is better when the first result is an understanding of what exactly needed to be done. Understanding “in development” is always more important than a static result.
Practice shows that it is impossible to rush in the IT sphere, but you should not hope for instant success. Information technology is developing too fast.
To count on economic success, you need to focus on dynamic IT projects that involve continuous development, rather than a specific static result.
IT Applications
It cannot be said that IT projects are bookkeeping, economics, and paperwork. Rather, these are three areas in which developers will still go on to perfection for a long time and that there are still few who can see beyond the horizon.
All the brilliant achievements in automating bureaucratic and financial accounting work to this day are being piled up by clouds of auxiliary programs and Excel tablets, without the possibility of automatically transferring data from month to month.
At the same time, there are many real areas of application of developers' labor with a clearly defined task and, difficult to implement, functionality. There is no need to think about how to do something dynamically and beautifully, but you just need to do it practical and effective.
Example 1. Access system
An enterprise that has a dozen branches in different cities, hundreds of visitors every day, thousands of suppliers and contractors, needs a throughput system.
Each separate unit has its own access control mode and its own equipment. The trouble is that this equipment is a menagerie of access systems of different generations, and the normative mode of admission depends on the mentality of the unit and the time of its formation in the enterprise.
It is not difficult to implement such an IT project, which will unite the entire throughput facilities for all separate divisions into a single system. It is a matter of time, and senior management will always know who and when came to work, and an employee can go with his pass to any unit in any city.
Example 2. Infrastructure Protection Perimeter
The modern information sphere is a growing world of threats. No matter how strange it may seem, but progress in the IT sector has become stably accompanied by an increase in the quantity and quality of malicious code and negative behavior, especially of “offended” company employees.
It is very difficult to build a defense bastion along the entire perimeter of possible negative phenomena. The opposing side is constantly improving the mechanisms and quality of attacks. This is not an enterprise throughput system, but still such IT projects are extremely popular and vital for any company, especially for large business.
When formulating these kinds of tasks, the risks of IT projects are significantly lower if the development team takes as a basis already tested and implemented ideas, and does not develop “their opinion” from the very beginning.
Currently, there are many proven solutions for creating high-quality protection, and most importantly, they all provide the accumulation of knowledge and heuristic methods for distributed application on the ground.
In fact, by betting on a well-known solution, a company can make its IT project as connecting its own infrastructure to protection mechanisms that “by themselves” develop according to the growth of threats.
Example 3. Web Resources: Management and Presentation
Sites are a recent past and the idea that a site is a resource on the Internet has long been out of date. Today, a web resource is an active point in a local or global network, which does not change its new status - it is an element of the company's infrastructure management or the face of the company for its customers, partners or just visitors.
A new attitude to web resources began when the idea of updating a page smoothly transformed into an adequate reaction of page elements to visitor actions, and the HTML code became secondary. Server languages, browser language and AJAX took the leading positions.
The web resource has become a real tool that allows a company of any size to form a management of its activities visually, intuitively and absolutely equivalent for all remote offices and for all employees, regardless of how they ended up in the company's infrastructure, through which device, by which access rights through which administrator or application.
Ideas of this kind are extremely difficult to implement, require high qualifications and competence from the project manager, and the effectiveness of the IT project here has the greatest risk of investment loss.
Example 4. Upgrading existing software
This is a sad area of ​​IT design. Surprisingly, not only Clarion from the distant 80s, Access from the heyday of BASIC and FoxPro is still alive and working on the entire line of versions from 2.6 to Visual FoxPro 6.0 (sly fox).
The problem here is not that it is difficult to rewrite the legacy of the past on the rails of the present, but that the mentality of company management and its users is often very difficult to change.
However, the feasibility of designing in this area is not in doubt, just the priority in the terms of reference for the IT project for modernization needs to be done on the educational aspect. Technologically, there is never anything complicated.
The software products of past years are simple, amazingly reliable and secure. It should be noted that the old is not susceptible to infection by viruses and does not respond to any modern threats.
The peculiarity of the old software in the context of protecting information and communications of the company should be highlighted and strive to somehow adaptively save it in a new form in its implementation.
Characteristics of IT projects
The goal, scope, lead time and equipped team are important as an idea of ​​what will be obtained as a result of the implementation of the IT project.
Extensive theoretical research on existing web resources, forums and expert knowledge in the field of IT design is undoubtedly significant.
But the most important characteristics in any IT project will be a clear statement of the problem, an obligation to bring the solution to a working result or a convinced decision about the impossibility of achieving it.
The path from the beginning of the formulation of the goal of the IT project to the final decision should be characterized by only three objective circumstances:
- a competent team performs its work strictly according to the plan, specifying it in the process of work;
- The interested customer pays the team timely and continuous process control;
- neither side takes into account any obstacles, neither temporary nor technological: both sides jointly and mutually correct solve all working problems.
If the implementation of an IT project is characterized by the indicated circumstances, the project will not only be brought to a brilliant economic effect, but will also open new horizons for the developer and for the customer.
Dynamics and self-adaptation in IT design
IT projects, examples of solutions, implementation results - this is not static.
In particular, a web resource is not a site with a fixed menu, functionality and number of pages. If so, then the result will be short-term and not promising.
An IT project is a dynamic, even in the first example (access control system), when it was necessary to unify the access of employees, partners and other persons to the territory of any company office in any city. Nothing stands still, especially in the field of information technology.
In the context of confident transformation of the IT sector into cloud technologies, into mobile applications and distributed work options from any device, the problem of self-adaptation of all solutions becomes extremely important.
Ideally, when a web resource (program, application) is not designed as its owner wishes or the developer sees it, it is offered as the client (consumer) needs it. The functional provider provides its products, solution services, but the choice of how and what to do is the consumer’s choice, the web resource should satisfy the interests of each consumer, as he wishes.
Upon careful consideration, such a transfer of the center of gravity is the implementation of an objective and effective rule: the ideal decision is not to make any decisions, but to provide qualitatively the opportunity to make decisions to other, in this case, consumers.