Technical debt can present many problems for your business. If you have a backlog of tech work, your company can fall behind. From here, your business may be increasingly susceptible to IT and technology mistakes that hamper its growth. Also, your company is prone to brand reputation damage, revenue losses, compliance violations, and associated problems.
How you prioritize your backlog of tech work can have far-flung effects. With the right approach, you can alleviate this backlog. Plus, you can prevent backlogs from becoming recurring problems for your IT and tech teams.
Prioritization Methods for Your Backlog of Tech Work
Stack Ranking and MoSCoW are two of the most common prioritization methods for tech work. Each method has its respective pros and cons. If you analyze both methods carefully, you can determine which one meets your business’ needs.
With the Stack Ranking method, you look at the top of a backlog of tech work and prioritize each item accordingly. The method requires you to review each backlog item, one by one. As you move down your backlog, you can prioritize each item based on several factors, including:
- Value to the customer
- Legal requirements
- Dependencies
If you use Stack Ranking, get multiple IT or tech team members involved in the process. This ensures IT and tech team members can work together to determine how to prioritize backlog items.
Comparatively, if you use the MoSCoW method, you’ll need to group tech backlog items into the following categories:
- Must-Have: Items that must be included
- Should Have: Items that are expected but not required
- Could Have: Items that would be great to include if sufficient time and budget for them are available
- Won’t Have: Items that will not be included
To use the MoSCoW method, you first need to classify backlog items into one of the previously mentioned categories. This will require you to conduct a deep dive into your tech backlog. As you do, you can determine what backlog items are necessary.
Tips to Prioritize Your Backlog of Tech Work
Do not wait to prioritize your backlog of tech work. Rather, invest time, energy, and resources to choose an appropriate prioritization method and begin the prioritization process immediately. Because, the sooner you prioritize your backlog of tech work, the sooner you can reap the benefits of your efforts.
Finally, be ready to support your IT and tech employees as they prioritize your backlog of tech work. Keep in mind that you can always augment your IT or tech team with temporary staff who can provide assistance during the prioritization process. By doing so, you can help your IT or tech team accomplish the best possible results.
Prioritize Your Backlog of Tech Work Today
Get started on the process of prioritizing your backlog of tech work. If you want to hire IT or tech staff to provide support during this process, DVA Technology can assist. We can connect you with exceptional IT and tech talent at your convenience. Please contact us to find out more.
