How Can An Acquirer Mitigate Risks In Software Engineering Projects?

ABSTRACT

Competition shall provide major incentives to industry and Government organizations to innovate, reduce cost, and increase quality. It is a mechanism to obtain a beneficial price to any acquirer (buyer). In such competitive business environment, software engineering projects are moving from Time & Material (TM) contracts to Fixed Price and Time (FPT) contracts that offers less risk to the acquirer. Though, FPT contract is more risky to developer (supplier), the FPT contract offers more profit if risks are managed properly. Therefore, it is important that all the “known risks” are identified and suitable measures to mitigate those risks are undertaken by the developer. The success of a project depends on effective management of all the known risks of the project (including that of the acquirer). Failure to identify and manage the known risks by the developer also becomes a major risk for the acquirer. This paper therefore identifies some important risks and measures that have to be undertaken before and during the Request for Proposal (RFP) by the acquirer.

Keywords:

Project managemen, software engineering, contract, cost plus, time and materia, fixed price and time, risk, risk mitigation.