How Estimate helps automate the evaluation process and find out the cost of an IT project
At the same time, there is a significant range of prices on the market: for example, one IT company estimates the work at 300 thousand rubles, and the other at 900 thousand. Cost depends on many factors: implementation method, expert experience, depth of assessment, etc.
For five years now, we at SimbirSoft have been using our own service to automate the evaluation process – Estimate. We raised him “from infancy”, so he takes into account the features of the development of IT systems. In the article we’ll tell you how you can use it to speed up the assessment and take into account possible risks.
To begin with, we will consider the main types of IT solutions, terms of development and the evaluation procedure, and then we will describe how you can automate the evaluation process for different types of tasks.
Types of IT Solutions
The cost of a project is primarily affected by such parameters as the urgency and complexity of development, including the need to integrate with external services. For a visual understanding, consider the following groups:
- Web application (e.g. corporate portal)
By its level of complexity, it can be classified as a large IT solution of medium complexity – without integration with third-party services, the administrative part is replaced by an API. The development time depends on the individual needs of the customer and can be up to 3000 hours in the presence of prototypes / design.
- Mobile app (e.g. sports training system)
In terms of complexity – an IT solution of medium complexity, without integration with third-party services, with a ready-made API and administrative part for hosting content. Development times can also be up to 3000 hours with prototypes / designs.
- Standard CRM
For example, a customer needs an application management system with an administrative panel that includes up to five sections – a list of users, orders, the ability to add content, etc. When developing on the basis of a ready-made platform and without integration with third-party services, the development time can be up to 800 hours.
- Advanced Systems
If a business needs an IT system with integration with third-party services (for example, public services), a personal account, the ability to send applications for certain products, it is important to understand that this is a large-scale work that requires sufficient time. Even if the system is based on a “box”, as a rule, it takes at least 3000 hours (and this is without taking into account additional solutions, for example, scoring).
Where does the assessment begin?
We already described on Habré 5 steps of the customer when choosing an IT product contractor, briefly recall the main steps:
- Search for candidates
- Collection of commercial offers
- Conduct of negotiations
- Filter Offers
- Decision-making
And now we offer a glimpse into the “kitchen” of the IT company to study this process from the inside.
1) Brief
When an IT company receives a call, an inbound project specialist, together with a client, fills out a brief and product requirements.
2) Presale
Presale – this can be called the entire evaluation stage, and the specialist responsible for it. He conducts an initial analysis of the project and answers key questions:
- what type of project, request, optimal scenario;
- what areas of development should be included in the assessment;
- what technological stack;
- assessment of which parts of the IT system remains on the customer side (if necessary).
To automate the evaluation process, IT companies use a variety of solutions – as we mentioned above, in SimbirSoft we have Estimate. Using its templates, Presale can calculate the terms for implementing standard functions, screens of a mobile application, various components of a project.
Presale analyzes at what stages a project reevaluation may be necessary (for example, after analytics), and also establishes additional time for testing and a risk reserve.
In order to study the needs of the customer and offer the best solution, in complex projects we include a working group in the assessment. It includes evaluators from different directions – for example, for a mobile application, it can be Mobile and Backend experts.
3) Commercial offer
Based on a preliminary assessment, the incoming project specialist draws up a proposal (KP), sends it to the client and monitors the receipt of feedback. With a positive decision, the company proceeds to the next stage – negotiations with the customer.
The timing of the assessment depends on the features of the project. The quickest approximate assessment is carried out, “by analogy” with similar applications – from 1 to 3 hours. For a standard mobile application, the calculation of terms and cost usually takes up to 8 hours, excluding mobile systems of increased complexity (for example, banking or insurance). Evaluation of web projects can take longer, usually up to 32 hours. If you need to develop a concept for a complex project, then the responsible specialist determines the terms individually.
If the customer does not yet imagine the requirements for the IT system, then the product engineer (Presale 2.0), an experienced specialist with technical expertise and a deep understanding of business processes, helps him understand the details.
Services for evaluating IT projects
Using various online assessment services, both business and the contractor can calculate the cost and estimated development timelines.
Finding the right service is a separate task. Most of the available solutions are either designed for other industries (for example, Smetter.ru for construction calculations), or have a universal nature and insufficient detail (various task schedulers).
There are special services for the IT sector, but often they do not allow an online assessment – you can only get the results by email. Foreign IT companies have similar services: for example, to calculate the cost of applications for iOS, Android, and web applications.
Example:
Estimate Cloud Service
At SimbirSoft, we automated our evaluation process in order to provide both transparent pricing for the business and convenience for ourselves.
In 2015, we launched an internal evaluation service – Estimate. Knowing the features of various IT-products, we have made a flexible universal “calculator” for web, desktop and mobile applications.
With the help of the service, we have already evaluated thousands of projects in analytics, design, UX, auditing, Frontend, Backend and other areas.
Key tasks of the service:
- Conduct an assessment in hours / money, taking into account the cost of working time of specialists.
- Consider the cost of the IT product, taking into account the risk reserve, management, testing (in% of the total development time).
- Ensure maximum accuracy of the assessment for the convenience of the project team.
- Automate the assessment process and use the experience of previous assessments.
- Speed up the estimate by an average of 10 times, compared with manual calculation in Excel, through the use of templates and auxiliary tools.
Attention! This year we decided to open our development to everyone. We invite you to use the cloud service on the site for free Estimater.ru!
How do we evaluate a project?
For everyone who wants to try the Estimate service in business, we have prepared visual instructions. See how to create new projects, tasks, adjust risks, keep ready estimates and perform other necessary actions.
Assessment Stages:
Project creation
Add the necessary features or tasks and specify the permissible range of labor costs in hours (taking into account development, testing and a time reserve for bug fixes).
Risk accounting
Lay in the project or in individual tasks the risks associated with inaccurate requirements and unforeseen situations.
Unloading
Using the service, you can estimate labor costs in two ways:
- Preliminary estimate (in the min-max range)
- Evaluation with high accuracy by the PERT method (Project Evaluation and Review Technique).
You can download the assessment results in any form that is convenient for you.
Creating a commercial offer
Download the results for working in Excel and select the level of detail: by features or by
project phases.
Templates of typical tasks and features
You can create rating templates. Add the feature to the rating, and the system will tell you if the template is available.
results
The ideal situation for business and IT companies is when project evaluations are quick and accurate. The better this process is built, the less risk is possible in further cooperation.
In our practice, we strive to highlight as specific tasks as possible. As a rule, with a top-level assessment, we devote no more than 40 hours to each task. This restriction allows us to evaluate the front of work deeper and more accurately and avoid mistakes.
We invite you to try our own cloud-based evaluation service. Estimater.ru, which takes into account all the key features and risks of developing IT products. With it, companies can automate and speed up the evaluation process, and customers can independently determine the estimated cost and terms of creating an IT product. You can work with the service for free or use the advanced corporate solution. We look forward to your feedback and suggestions!
Thank you for attention! We hope you find this article helpful.
