No one wants to see their business in the papers for a technical malfunction that brought a critical application down, caused a leak of information, or created liable situations for their business.

However, every day we read a story about how an application went down, or a glitch resulted in a negative impact directly or indirectly to the business.

Many departments have found specific tools that can make their individual arena of expertise easier to manage, but organizations struggle to put it all together.

When it comes to the creation of software for a mission critical application or service, it's the ability to collaborate and share information from inception to release that helps avoid disaster. Knowing that the Analysts have worked closely with the business to create the requirments; knowing that the development teams are in step with the analysts; knowing that testers are working against approved requirments and when requirements change (and they will change!)everyone understands the impact of the change so they can react appropriately. Accurate and up to date information is key.

There are many different ways to exchange information and manage the application lifecycle. Many organziations rely on tools like word or excel, others use a varity of different tools depending on what's deemed best for their specific roles, others still look to an enterprise solution like MKS Integrity to provide a single source of truth.

Deciding which method to manage your application lifecycle really depends on how important software is to your business! Does a missed release deadline impact your business? Does it matter if an application is released with a few bugs? What type of decisions are being made based on the visibility into your application lifecyle. What is your tolerance to software risk?

Take a look at the headlines in today's paper - I wonder if those folks are re-evaluating the important of software to their organizations?

Do you have a story on how you avoided disaster? or perhaps how you fell into a disaster of your own? We'd love to hear from you and your thoughts, comments, or questions on managing software engieering!

Until next time,

Kathy

P.S. MKS hosted a webinar where Forrester ALM analyst Carey Schwaber addresses the importance of lifecycle visibility and traceability in application development. if you are interested - go to: http://www.mks.com/resources/data/multimedia/webinars/instances/the-three-pillars-of-application-lifecycle-management-5