Discovery Phase for Software Project

You can rely on your fate and luck when implementing new ideas, or draft a blueprint with a proficient team and lock up the silverware. The Magora team believes that a well-thought-out plan is a point of departure for a fruitful software development process.

What is a Discovery Phase?

It is the very beginning of the work on your project that involves fundamental analysis and working out efficient strategies to gain an in-depth understanding of a future software product application. Typically, the discovery phase embraces a particular set of key issues, but anyway, it varies from project to project. If you just start your idea implementation from scratch, it is necessary to think about how the monetization will be organized. If you are already a happy business owner, it's high time to ask how to increase efficiency by automating routine tasks. Strictly speaking, the discovery phase is a good way to test the strength of your idea. It is formed on the basis of the following points:

• scope of the project;
• software functionality;
• competitive analysis and market research;
• risk management;
• strategies for cases of business expansion;
• picking out unambiguous features; 
• defining the customers’ role;
• design vision of the future product.

As a result, by the end of this phase, you will have a comprehensive detailed product representation that includes all provided documentation, feature explanations, and visualized screen flow. 

Why is the Discovery Phase necessary?

The software development process is quite multicomponent, which is why you may forget about one of a thousand little things if you are operating to the touch. We are sure that without thorough preparation, it is hard to create high-quality products that meet the initial expectations. Moreover, the project will presumably go beyond the money and time frames without proper time-bound targets and planning expenses. Unexpected pitfalls make the process long enough and exhausting. Still, it is important to note that all projects are unique, and we approach each client individually. So, for most software development projects, a short discovery phase is recommended to discuss the key milestones, highlight weaknesses, and form a strategy to avoid technical errors. If you are an IT expert, a business guru or an apprentice, there will be a different approach with a dwindling influence, respectively. Our professional team is here to shed light on the complexities of the development process and mitigate them in advance. The discovery phase includes software approbation in order to walk in the user’s shoes and confirm the viability of the project.

The Discovery Phase advantages

• Insight into the business processes within the developed software;
• a set budget;
• a schedule of deadlines for each phase and the project in general;
• optimization of the budget in order to accelerate reaching ROI;
• risk analysis and reduction;
• a stepwise expected outcome.

At the end of the Discovery Phase, you will get a Software Requirement Specification (SRS) that serves as a detailed plan of the project phases and identifies the staff involved and responsible for each one. It will help you to stay on top of the development process and have clear documentation to provide stakeholders and prospective investors with.

Can I skip the discovery phase?

It is also one of the possible variants of bespoke software development, but it requires a special model of development called SCRUM. It implies meetings and discussion of assignments once every two weeks and working hard on the agreed parts of the project until the next meeting. This solution is available to modern, highly qualified IT companies, but, nevertheless, it has a higher risk of mistakes and further rework. To prevent such a scenario, we recommend starting your project with the discovery phase. On our part, we strive to give you confidence and assistance throughout the whole development process, and we want your product to be honed to perfection. Please contact us if you have remaining questions so that we can clear them up and dispel all doubts.

Alex G.

August 21, 2022