Advantages and disadvantages of special purpose software

Advantages and disadvantages of special purpose software update#
Advantages and disadvantages of special purpose software software#

The amount of process-adjustment needed is directly related to how well the off-the-shelf solution fits your needs, so when considering this type of solution itвЂ™s vital you consider what youвЂ™re not getting: what business requirements wonвЂ™t be addressed, and how are you going to accomplish these things instead? Will you be able to adjust your processes, or will you have to implement new systems to work alongside the new software? Will this create long term inefficiencies? Retraining personnel, a slower work rate, and critical missing functionality can actually increase costs and workload. It will come with pre-ordained processes, functionality, and flows that will likely not match how you go about business today.

Advantages and disadvantages of special purpose software software#

Even something as subtle as the vernacular being used throughout the software can be completely different to how you communicate as a business or within your industry.

The fact that you will have to adjust your processes and staff behavior to fit the software (rather than the software fitting your business) is one of hidden cost. Most off-the-shelf solutions will not be a perfect fit for your company. Over time these fees may actually exceed the costs of a customized solution without any of the advantages. But вЂњcostвЂќ alone is somewhat superficial: the initial purchase cost is only one of the possible price considerations for off-the-shelf software because upgrades, software support, monthly or annual licensing fees, per-website or installation licenses, and per-seat costs can all inflate budget needs to considerably higher levels. There are strong benefits when considering an off-the-shelf solution, primarily the low up-front cost. The larger the audience for an off-the-shelf solution the more likely it will be you simply get the features printed on the box, which may or may not capture what you need. Because of that, the softwareвЂ™s features and functions have to be more generic or massively more complex, which might be feature-rich but ultimately, includes a lot of things that your company does not need. Off-the-shelf solutions are typically affordable because their development costs are distributed across the broader audience вЂ“ but you get what you get.

These are software solutions aimed at addressing specific needs, but they are targeted towards a mass-market audience vs.

Imagine off-the-shelf software as a вЂboxed solution.вЂ™ ItвЂ™s a commercial product targeted towards a large audience (sometimes worldwide). Once you understand the business need and the way to go about addressing that (or what the process will be in the case of a new, emergent business challenge), weвЂ™re ready to look at your options. In the case of a custom solution itвЂ™s likely the company youвЂ™re working with will help you (more of this below) with this discovery process, as itвЂ™s as important to them as it is to you that they understand your business needs and what the software should accomplish. But whether youвЂ™re looking at off-the-shelf solutions or something more customized, a natural part of your process should be analyzing what exactly you want the software to be able to do and вЂ“ ideally вЂ“ what process it follows in order to do it. Maybe your sales force is spread all over the country and everyone is using a different method to track customers, so a centralized client relationship management tool is in order.Д«usiness needs vary wildly with the size and nature of the company, existing systems and processes, and вЂ“ of course вЂ“ the specific function of the tool itself.

Advantages and disadvantages of special purpose software update#

So what are you trying to solve for? Perhaps you need to continuously update content on your website and are looking at implementing a content management system. But even if a piece of software is given to you for free, if it does not meet any of your needs or address your challenges it is effectively worthless and вЂ“ worse вЂ“ could actually cost you in the form of retraining staff, changing your processes to adapt to the software, and so on.ДЄs we go into this decision making process the golden rule here is: understand your business needs and make sure the solution is a good fit. Yes, there are many considerations that make up вЂњbusiness needs,вЂќ and they span functionality, budget, return-on-investment, and so forth.