Managing software projects with business-based requirements

For many organizations that are neither software product companies nor system integrators, the expense and cultural change required for full process rollout can be prohibitive. Proponents of agile processes/methods (such as extreme programming) suggest that these "lightweight" approaches are extremely effective. I would agree that there are many powerful aspects within these approaches. I suggest, however, that by taking an objective-based business requirements approach to project management, software projects have a high probability of running on time, and remaining in scope and within budget. Addressing requirement challenges, independent of adopting a full process, can offer many of the benefits of full process adoption while avoiding most of the expense and human issues involved with full process rollout. A business-based requirements approach is an easy-to-adopt, risk-free entry point that offers tangible quality improvements. This approach suits any project scope. Whether building a complex system for enterprise resource planning or customer relationship management, or developing small, single-user software programs, defining business requirements improves any system delivery.