When you need to create something from scratch you usually try to achieve your goal with off the shelve software in order to get a head start and to benefit from its maturity. You choose software by matching it against your requirements.

Sometimes though you should adapt your requirements to available software.

I’m talking about software like a CMS or a CRM system. Big functional components that would be far too costly to develop yourself.

It’s a crucial question when to stop focussing on your requirements and include available options into the evaluation as if you do this too early you might end up with a software that doesn’t fit your requirements or if you do this too late you might not find any software solution because your requirements went far too specific.

To find this moment you need to distinguish must have requirements from nice to have ones.

Ensure that your must haves are met by the solution in focus and be ready to adapt your nice to haves to what is actually available. This will minimize your development efforts a great deal and makes maximum use of the software in question.

Evaluation · requirements

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