The value of Information:

In today’s world, both businesses and individuals hold a large amount of very sensitive information. The world of e-banking holds all our financial information like credit card details, bank account details, pin numbers, etc which have to be handled very carefully. The world of social media contains most of the personal information of a large part of the globe. Businesses on the other hand, have all their employees’ data including financial results, trade secrets and future plans.
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Q3 technologies signs an extended team contract with a Europe based large portal for online games playable on mobile phones, interactive digital television and other virtual environments. Q3’s PHP developers will be responsible for the enhancement of this portal.
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Q3 technologies has signed a contract with a customer in Northern Europe to develop a product to integrate their international Freight handling and customs applications with shippers like leading logistics and freight handling companies.
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SharePoint is one of the most leading and effective tool, which is marketed by Microsoft. SharePoint helps in improving the business environment for regulated workflow and collaborative working for the users. SharePoint can be considered as an array of technology, where Windows SharePoint Services is the underlying one.  By using SharePoint Development tool, the visitors can create custom views of the website. This customization can be very simple or very complex, depending on the type and version of the product that is installed. Moreover, SharePoint has a strong collaboration model that is tightly integrated with the Office 2003 suite.

SharePoint development means integrating SharePoint into the existing software development environment. SharePoint is a Microsoft product and is used to develop information portals in various outsourced product development as well as offshore product development organizations, which are into offshore software development process. These information portals help people to connect and collaborate with the information available in the organization. Windows SharePoint Services has a unique feature to scale thousands of sites within an organization by supporting load-balanced web farms and clustered database. Decentralized content administration system makes SharePoint development a highly secure and reliable application with the ability to assign access rights and monitor content to keep information secure and compliant, which proves beneficial for offshore software development companies.

Benefits of using SharePoint services in your organization are as under:

1. Centralized control over all organizational data and facilitate association.
2. Easy and cost-effective extensibility.
3. Provide content and management features.
4. Increases efficiency by providing search capabilities.
5. Increase operational workflow and make daily activities simpler.
6. Notify people by alerts and emails as and when any changes are done.

Once installed SharePoint portals provide fully featured portal to users. Based on Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services, SharePoint server can serve a maximum of 1,000,000 users in active directory. The content and the layout of the website can also be personalized using SharePoint Portal Development. The content is easily searchable and users receive alerts when documents are changed or added. SharePoint developers also make sure that this application is secure and reliable. It has a decentralized content administration system, which monitors the content and assigns access rights thereby keeping the documents secure. SharePoint development is endorsed by companies irrespective of their size. SharePoint development presents a feasible solution for information sharing needs among the employees. It is intended for flexible and easy use of the application development that can be modified as per the approach of any offshore product development company.

An offshore product development company helps you to pull out the best out of your investment into your business. By using the custom programmed software that is developed by a company using customized programming, you get the opportunity to join that league of industry leaders, which have done drastically well in their respective fields. One of the biggest advantages of using custom programming is that it helps a company reduce the cost of training incurred on its employees. Custom software programming is developed to meet only specific demands. Therefore, you focus more on training those people who will be using that software for the benefit of the firm.

Custom Software programming is in itself a very crucial segment of any software programming endeavor; when it is bound to be customized, developers are often endowed with more responsibilities. Today, scenario has changed a lot; software programming industry does not withdraw on the software programming of the custom sort. For all those outsourced product development companies as well as other personalized software needs, there are many options available in the expert hands of the software developers. Thus, it all depends on how well you make your approach. Custom software programming service is a concept that provides the solution to your problems that occurs from the traditional methods of working. When you are using readymade tools and it does not provide you the reports as required, it becomes useless and even more time wasting when you keep using it though it does not comply with your needs. Things even get more difficult when you are not using the software at all and keep working in traditional pen and paper method messing with registers, ledgers and pile of files. When it comes to custom software programming, it remains completely as its name suggests custom or tailor-made. Custom-made software is the one that is made after analyzing your problems such as, your work processes, your current system of working, how your staff would be working on it during the routine process in order to find out the right solution for your need and to give you the desired output in forms of reports, results, and revenues.

In custom programming, the applications available program is specifically accustomed to the operations of the company. Thus, there is no more room for subjectivity as the whole process is broken down to simplistic objective choices to cover all the possible outcomes. Lesser room for error and mistakes make for a more objective application of the custom programming. Also, the main benefit of the customized programs is security of the system. Not only can the processes of the business harder to replicate, there is also a bigger headache when it comes to pilferage the information. The custom program would not be able to run if parts of it were broken down or if its output stolen. Vital security features such as, passwords and encryption allows the customization to be the main security aspect of the program.

Business intelligence is a broad category of applications and technologies for gathering, storing, analyzing, and providing access to data to help enterprise users make better business decisions in an offshore product development organisation. BI applications include the activities of decision support systems, query and reporting, online analytical processing (OLAP), statistical analysis, forecasting, and data mining.

Business Intelligence becomes effective when it provides insight and helps you predict outcomes. Business Intelligence helps you track your mistakes, control your present and forecast future results based on your business decisions. Business Intelligence gives the maximum benefit to customers in terms of cost savings, improved quality, access to highly talented professionals, flexibility of operations and reduced time to market. Business intelligence services are driven towards customer’s current and future needs in mind, providing feature-rich solutions that are built on standard technologies. BI services have helped customers and partners increase productivity and efficiency by transforming data into actionable information.

Business Intelligence solutions can:

• Reduce total cost of managing and delivering information

• Support self-service access to information for employees, partners and clients

• Promote collaboration/workflow

• Automate legacy processes

• Reduce cost of business operations

Some of Business Intelligence Services are:

• Reporting – Reporting gives you access to a complete list of report types. With the reporting capability, you can personalize the style and quality of Business Intelligence delivered to your key stakeholders; and you expand the community of business intelligence users.

• Analysis – The analysis solution in BI enables the guided exploration of information that pertains to all dimensions of your business, regardless of where the data is stored. Analyze and report against online analytical processing (OLAP) and dimensionally aware relational sources. With the analysis capability, you can personalize the style and quality of business intelligence delivered to the client. OLAP tools such as Hyperion are geared towards slicing and dicing of the data. As such, they require a strong metadata layer, as well as front-end flexibility.

• Dashboards – Business dashboards communicate complex information quickly. They translate information from your various corporate systems and data into visually rich presentations using gauges, maps, charts, and other graphical elements to show multiple results together in an outsourced product development company. Dashboards — operational, tactical, and strategic — help you monitor, measure, and manage corporate performance.

Q3, an offshore product development company, has signed a contract with a customer in Northern Europe to develop a product to integrate their international Freight handling and customs applications with shippers like leading logistics and freight handling companies.

Through the Freight Handling Solution, lead logistics providers are able to allocate loads to their preferred partners through a single, web based interface. The transport providers update the Lead Logistics Provider with their acceptance or rejection of each load. Then through the Freight Management Solution they can provide complete check point data for every shipment. The Lead Logistics Providers are able to assess and evaluate their partners through a suite of comprehensive KPI programs. It also allows lead logistics providers to have a greater visibility to accurate and genuine on-time delivery performance.

Q3 Technologies, an Offshore Outsourcing Company, offers to develop a competitive advantage by using technology in a more productive or effective way than your competitors. These solutions can become an efficient method for both industry leaders and small companies to reduce expenses and retain a competitive advantage. Q3 provides total flexibility in terms of outsourced  product development – the process is essentially “Client Driven”.

Q3 is a leading provider of comprehensive and user-friendly logistics software solutions. We develop Logistic & Transportation software for companies of all sizes within the Industry.

All types of marketing share a common goal. They aim to highlight the features of a product or service. In order to achieve that goal, the website owner always goes in search of yet another interactive marketing solution. The website owner seeks assistance with its interactive marketing team.

Using interactive marketing solution, the website owner seeks to develop a greater familiarity with the desires of the website viewer who take the time to view their website. Such a solution helps the website owner to fashion a website that appeals to the internet user. Many offshore product development companies are increasingly providing interactive marketing solutions.

Interactive online marketing frequently makes use of e-mail messages. Those messages are commonly sent with a signature file. Signature files appear in every message sent by the website owner, who has made skillful use of the e-mail software. Signature files facilitate a response from the person who got the e-mail message, which can contain important marketing information. That is why e-mail should be considered as an example of interactive marketing. Many offshore product development  services show the website owner how to use interactive banner ads. Such ads contain all of the essential elements of interactive marketing. Interactive marketing can also call for the use of interactive digital marketing. Digital marketing assists with the collection of data. Every response is quickly and easily recorded, and is thus made available to the website owner.

Many Web developers have failed to realize that Web content goes far beyond the text of the website. Only text is not synonymous or identical to content. You should not think that content is all about words, sentences, paragraphs, and pages. Here is the reality: Web content is about user interactivity. There are many, many types of content. Everything on your website is content. Think of things this way, users want to experience your website and not just reading an endless stream of words. For both the online and offline advertising, you create content. Content will continue to evolve, with the introduction of new types of content. Some of the most popular websites on the Web keep on adding interactive content to get and keep people’s attention.

To remain competitive, every website should do something unique to make it more attractive. If you are not creating or overhauling your website into a totally web 2.0 sites then interactive content is a great way to start. Users do not necessarily create their own interactive content, rather they use interactive tools on the websites to educate themselves, answer their obvious questions, or just have fun. Examples of these interactive tools are online games, online calculators, blogs, maps, journals, voting, and comment boxes. Interactive content is best when it is colorful, easy to use and engaging while still managing to be useful, helpful and informative.

Software Development companies develop unmatched software while making use of advance technologies, which is affordable. Outsourced Software development Companies has changed over a period. They are nowadays focusing on qualitative, timely delivered and cost-effective development services. Software development companies have grown largely over the past couple of years with major IT giants establishing their base. The number of software development companies in India has increased to a number no one could have ever imagined.

Software companies are providing all kinds of IT solutions under one roof apart from outsourcing their services globally. This growth has led to a huge competition between software development companies. Every company is working to outdo each other to climb the ladder of success. This has increased the demand for software developers. Skilled developers are being paid highly by multinationals. The key is to possess good IT knowledge and skills. Apart from good manpower, software companies need to pay attention to the budget planning and project management that is to maintain right balance between quality and cost. Technical skills and business skills are also equally important. Also, attention has to be paid to services in terms of innovation, skills, cost, time, and quality. Knowledge management and team management are of equal importance.

In India, there are a number of software development companies, who can provide with all kinds of software solutions with best quality and prices. Offshore software development companies in India are skillful in distinguished technologies and are competent of delivering outstanding results in cost effective manner. With so much potential, knowledge base, enthusiasm and willingness, it is not a difficult task to meet the escalating demands of the lucrative software development field. Software Development Company in India has a bright future, as it is the best option for offshore clients who are in search for alternative source with comparative inexpensive labor but upgraded technology. Software Development Company follows the entire software development life cycle. This is executed with the help of the expert professional staff including the software architects, project managers and the quality analysts, which contributes toward the growth of the company in the market.

An issue tracking software comprises of software packages that maintains and manages any problems that arises in an outsourced software development organization. An issue tracking system contains a site that has all details concerning each of their customers. An issue tracking system also contains a file that has information on features and designs of a system, which is available on the help desk.

Issue tracking software is helpful for many reasons. When it comes to running a business and keeping track of large amounts of data, things can sometimes go wrong to the point of your not knowing how to fix them. However, with an issue tracking software, problems with your project or database will be dealt with and solved immediately.

Issue tracking software installs a help desk right into your computer so that when something happens to your system database or the information system things can be controlled. Having someone at your aide can be of immense help, especially if computer maintenance is not where your strength lies. There is the feature of reporting the issue either over e-mail or by phone. This ensures that the help you receive will be intelligible and benefits your specific problem in a timely manner.

Issue tracking software does more than helping you to solve Issues. It lets you keep track of the status of the project like how far the project has reached in the execution stage. It helps you to assess your team’s Issue tracking efforts and you will be able to assess the important project metrics, such as testing, project progress, and more. Issue tracker software also lets new team members get up to speed quickly. They can see how far the software application is developed, what issues are open and closed, and who is assigned to each issue. A good Issue tracking software application should let you arrange the issues by categories too. You can easily track who is assigned what in the team. Issue tracker software can be a great management tool.

One of the important uses of Issue tracking software is to create a knowledge base so that team members and eventually the support staff can see the procedures used to solve issues. The new issue will be similar to one that has already been fixed, so by just looking at older issues, the new ones can be solved. Issue tracking software helps in generating reports. This is an imperative management tool and saves the time that managers spend on compiling information for reports so that they can actually spend more time in managing and less time in pushing paper. It can also be used in the employee appraisal process.

In an offshore software development company, Issue tracking especially for large projects is a very complex process. A planned approach to software development with a detailed and automated process for addressing those issues that come up during development and even after the development when the application is in maintenance mode. Issue tracking software helps you manage issues by increasing the productivity, reducing downtime, more satisfied customers and greater communications between all the team members and other teams.

Q3 Technologies will be exhibiting at the IndiaSoft Meet to be held on 10 – 12 March 2010, at Jaipur, India.

IndiaSoft 2010 is the country’s first IT event which provides the IT companies an excellent platform to showcase their IT products and services. IndiaSoft helps the participants to understand about technology, market development and dynamics about the industry. This meet will be visited by IT buyers from Latin America, Africa, CIS, Asean, North America, Europe, Japan, Middle East region.

India Soft is covering various areas of outsourcing and globalization. At IndiaSoft conference we get to meet industry leaders, executives, and practitioners who are leveraging global services to tackle economic challenges and to strategically grow their business. The Conference will provide the opportunity to network with global speakers and panelists including top enterprise executives, global sourcing providers and industry and business analysts.

Q3 technologies is also looking forward to an active participation in the exhibition. We will be displaying our IT products & services to make useful business alliance with the customer from all over the world. This year IndiaSoft focuses on commercialization of new and emerging technologies. IndiaSoft provides an opportunity to Exhibitors as well as Buyers globally looking for outsourcing IT services & solutions including KPO, BPO, Banking, Finance, Insurance, Telecommunications, Media & Entertainment, Bio Informatics, Engineering Design, Travel, Hotel, Hospitality, Logistics, and much more…under one roof. There will be around 100 Indian IT Tier II and III companies displaying their IT services and around buyers from 70 countries for business networking. This year the exhibition will emphasize on commercialization of new and emerging technologies.

Companies gain new customers from participating in exhibitions like IndiaSoft. Q3 technologies got many new customers last year from this event and we are hoping to get many more this year too by having a successful show at the event.

Dot Net Nuke is an open source application. Dot Net Nuke is a Web Application Framework which consists of its own Content Management System.  Dot Net Nuke is a free Application from Microsoft which is yet another benefit. It is written using Windows ASP.NET Framework and VB.net. It is mostly used for the Creation, Distribution and management of Websites, Intranet and Extranet and can Customized through Modules and Skins. Dot Net Nuke is made with a Motive to provide Administrators, Designers, Web developers and People of other niches with ease of management and use. User Interface provided by DNN makes it even easier for everyone to manage other things which can be really difficult at times. Every element of your Dot Net Nuke website can have specific security settings applied to allow or deny users from seeing, editing, or administering the different parts of your site. Easily keep your website up to date. Simply login from anywhere in the world and add the content you require.

Q3 Technologies confirms its participation at CeBIT 2010, to be held in Hannover, Germany from 2^nd – 6^th March 2010.

Germany is a significant market for Q3 technologies as this will be Q3’s fourth year in a row at CeBIT. Q3 is committed to providing the German market with superior Software products and services. At CeBIT, Q3 Technologies would be showcasing its expertise across a gamut of innovative solutions built around cutting edge technologies in Microsoft .Net, Java, Cloud and other open source platforms.

CeBIT provides an opportunity for companies to come together and present their strategies and products. The key target groups are users from industry, the wholesale/retail sector, skilled trades, banks, the services sector, government agencies, science and all users interested in technology.

Ramana Rao, VP of Engineering Q3 Technologies shared his opinion on Scrum and Agile development methods used by Indian software companies. “I think Scrum and Agile development methods have started making their mark in India. As a matter of fact, many companies have started moving away from the traditional Waterfall model. The change is imminent as customers start getting unequivocal in their demand of “quickly watch things working”. Companies will be successful as long as they are able to manage shorter learning curves, impose strict quality guidelines within constantly dwindling development iteration’s and at the same time reduce rework.”

Ramana also talked about the new Project Management approaches in India that have gained popularity in recent times. He mentioned “CMMi benchmarks stipulated by Software Engineering Institute (SEI) will continue to provide a significant and solid process and management foundation and will help companies to improvise on their project planning, execution, monitoring and delivery mechanisms.  In the context, it is pertinent to note that, of recent, best practices stated by PMI (Project Management Institute) are gaining a lot of popularity in the Indian IT Industry circles. The good thing is that both of the above approaches share a lot in common and  chances of conflict are none or minimal.”

Q3 Technologies will also be exhibiting at the IndiaSoft Meet to be held on 10 – 12 March 2010, at Jaipur, India. This meet will be visited by IT buyers from Latin America, Africa, CIS, Asean, North America, Europe, Japan, Middle East region.

MS Sharepoint is the latest technology that integrates well with Microsoft business applications and tools. Microsoft Windows Sharepoint Services enable you to share and handle information and documents in a systematic and secured way. Sharepoint has drastically changed our day-to-day communication and the way we interact with each other. One of the most popular software packages for businesses today is Microsoft SharePoint Server.

Sharepoint adds a new dimension to the way of communication. Sharepoint services include various tools for improving the productivity. Sharepoint tools can be used to help the users connect and exchange information/resources they need. Most of the Microsoft Office System programs are integrated in it. This integration makes it easier for the users to use the system quickly. Sharepoint Services can also be used for storage and retrieval of documents. Sharepoint is quite useful for its scalability. You can configure Sharepoint portal development Services from a web browser or command line utilities. You need not to install any huge or complicated application on your desktop for connecting and configuring the Sharepoint Services.

Sharepoint development services also helps to manage the documents quite effectively and even control the user level access for documents. You can define which documents can be accessed by which user. Users can access one version of the file and make changes in it. You have the ability to view the revisions and restore it to previous versions. One of the important things is that SharePoint is specifically designed to handle the documents and version control. SharePoint handles this with comprehensive version control and a check in/out system to maintain document integrity. Template based solutions are also available with Sharepoint services. You can use application templates to customize. It also provides advanced business controls. Using this advanced control, you can secure your information. It allows you to set permissions even down to the document or item level.

One of the main benefits of using Microsoft SharePoint Server is the ability to manage and control the content that is entering or leaving your business. The platform can also be used to access documents and workspaces that need to be shared among a number of individuals, such as databases and commonly used forms. Microsoft SharePoint Server is a very popular program for businesses, because it helps to improve business processes without the requirement of extensive training. Many different types of users would be able to use Microsoft SharePoint Server effectively and the platform allows for easier control of many business processes. Microsoft SharePoint Server also gives users the ability to organize and edit their documents quickly and easily. Documents can be organized using any number of different criteria. The collaborative editing is also possible using the applications available with the software. Microsoft SharePoint Server also includes updated navigation features and the ability to search documents using a number of different methods. Many companies are using SharePoint as a content management system to host an Internet site. There is no limit to the layout or functionality of a SharePoint site.

Web conferencing is basically a web meeting which is interactive not only in terms of audio and video but also by allowing the sharing of documents and files and viewing them online. It is a means that brings people together from multiple locations to share information in an interactive environment with other users over the Internet. Web conferencing increases productivity by having decision makers located in a single place to discuss strategic topics pertaining to business.

Web technology has replaced face-to-face meetings among sales teams and executive boards because it saves travel costs and increases productivity. Web conferencing is a technology that places crucial information in a visually appealing way at the fingertips of professionals. How you choose to use web conferencing will very much depend upon your line of work. Web conferencing is relatively a new communications phenomenon that offers numerous benefits and advantages.

Efficiency – Nowadays, it is very essential to get your view across in a clear way. Quality communication can help to move your business forward and boost its success. By using web conferencing to connect with peers and clients, you will be able to deliver messages effectively and efficiently.

Builds Relationships – Web conferencing helps you to create strong bonds with others by allowing you to communicate with them in a personal way, even when you are sitting at different locations. It can also help meeting participants residing in different locations to work together in an interactive and dynamic way.

Eliminates Geographical Distances – Web conferencing can bridges the geographical distances by allowing for virtual meeting experiences that are same as face-to-face meeting. No matter where the meeting participants may be located, this type of conferencing brings everyone together into a single working environment, allowing for more fulfilling and productive discussions.

Saves Time and Money – Web conferencing helps you to streamline your work, which leads to significantly reducing your travel time allowing you to conduct productive and engaging meetings without ever leaving your office. Online conferencing makes collaborating with colleagues and clients highly convenient by reducing the need to travel. Web conferencing also allows you to save money.

Versatility and Flexibility – Web conferencing provides you the benefit from its high level of versatility and flexibility. From team collaborations to providing training and orientation to new employees, web conferences have multiple uses and can meet numerous communications requirements.

ERP or Enterprise resource planning is a term used in conjunction with Enterprise Resource Planning software which is used to manage and coordinate all functions, resources and information of a business, available on a shared data source. ERP is a strategic tool, which helps the company to gain a competitive edge by integrating all business processes and optimizing the resources available so as to manage the enterprise as a whole.

ERP has many advantages which can benefit the company in the long run.  ERP helps in faster processing of information and reduces the burden of paperwork. It gives customer satisfaction in terms of prompt responses and follow ups. It helps in having a say over your competitor and adapting to the ups and downs of the market and business fluctuations. ERP is suitable for global operations as it encompasses all the domestic jargons, currency conversions, diverse accounting standards, and multilingual facilities. ERP helps to control the data and facilitates the necessary contacts to acquire the same. It helps in streamlining of financial and administrative systems.

One of the greatest benefits of incorporating ERP as a key business strategy is its ability to fundamentally eliminate multiple systems with no more redundancy. Individual agencies can hereby share important information in a standardized way, proving for a reduction in time spent doing this and a resulting improvement in productivity. All-in-all costs are reduced by implementing ERP for discovering only the best practices for all the business processes needed to be carried out.

ERP is a technology formed with the fusion of small, separate segments of an enterprise to form a larger, interactive unit. The atmosphere of ERP is inevitable and the architecture is robust. You can analyze data across all departments and interpret most important information. Information flow across boundaries experiences least viscosity, providing customized business solutions.

Modern businesses run systems, IT networks and corporate applications and manage business processes that often become unwieldy, complex and difficult to manage. An ERP solution with its business process transformation capabilities is generally favored by enterprise IT managers, chief information officers and chief technology officers to integrate and better manage business operations and ever-increasing business applications and network systems. The solution in its early deployment stages integrates key business processes and functions such as finance, manufacturing, purchase, production planning, human resources, sales and marketing.

A successful implementation of ERP software can result in medium-term business benefits. Top management are able to get real-time insight into business activities and operations across locations and can adjust short-term strategic objectives and goals. Employees can access and manage enterprise applications on demand. Over time, businesses learn to be more quick, competitive and productive.

Agile methodology is an approach to project management. It helps team respond to the unpredictability of building software through incremental, iterative work cadences, known as sprints. Agile software development is a framework utilized for software development projects. It was born out of frustration within traditional project management activities. An Agile methodology minimizes risk in software development.

Some of the principles behind the Agile manifesto are:

• Customer satisfaction by rapid, continuous delivery of useful software.

• Working software is delivered frequently.

• Working software is the principal measure of progress.

• Close, daily cooperation between business people and developers.

• Simplicity.

• Self-organizing teams.

• Regular adaptation to changing circumstances.

Agile software development is a framework for software engineering that promotes development processes throughout the life-cycle of the project. Agile allows your team to identify the most critical features of the software that can be completed within a short time frame and it delivers a complete build with this set of limited features as the first iteration. Once that is done, you can move those features to production or continue on to the next iteration. Agile projects are released to production months where Waterfall projects normally span a year or more before they are released to production.

Agile methods emphasize real time communication, preferably face-to-face, over written documents. Most agile teams are located in a bullpen and include all the people necessary to finish the software. At a minimum, this includes programmers and the people who define the product such as product managers, business analysts, or actual customers. The bullpen may also include testers, interface designers, technical writers, and management. Agile software development focuses on keeping code simple, testing often, and delivering functional bits of the application as soon as they’re ready. The goal of agile software development is to build upon small client-approved parts as the project progresses, as opposed to delivering one large application at the end of the project.

Advantages of Agile

• Agile methodology has an adaptive team which is able to respond to the changing requirements.

• The team does not have to invest time and effort in delivering the product.

• Face to face communication and continuous inputs from customer representative.

• The documentation is the crisp and to the point to save time.

• The end result is the high quality software in least possible time duration and satisfied customer.

Scrum is a simple Agile method for software development. Scrum is one model of the Agile movement and represents a typical shift from “waterfall,” a traditional project management approach that, until recently, has dominated software development. Scrum assumes that the software development process is complicated and unpredictable and treats it as a controlled black box instead of a theoretical, fully-defined process.

Characteristics of a good Scrum tool are:

1) It must not have a fixed process flow. The team must be able to tweak the process to fit their culture and organization.

2) It must be simple enough to enable not get in the way. The team must drive the project rather than the tool.

3) It must produce status and progress reports that are customizable and accessible to the business. Feedback is the process that keeps Scrum / Agile on track in a world of changing priorities.

4) The process must have a business value driven approach. In other words the project management tool must drive business value and make business value delivery clear to the team and stakeholders.

Another characteristic of Scrum is that the software development process isn’t treated as a linear process. Scrum, however, doesn’t prescribe a sequence in which the activities must be implemented. A project can start with any activity, and can change between activities at any time. This increases the project’s flexibility and productivity.

To manage these processes with flexibility, Scrum supplies techniques and controls to manage this unpredictable process. The Scrum method is deliberately designed as a framework that can be applied to existing processes. A key principle of Scrum is its recognition that during a project the customers can change their minds about what they want and that unpredicted challenges cannot be easily addressed in a traditional predictive or planned manner. As such, Scrum adopts an empirical approach—accepting that the problem cannot be fully understood or defined, focusing instead on maximizing the team’s ability to deliver quickly and respond to emerging requirements.

Project Management is the correct utilization of time involving the resources, people, money and the related sub-resources.  Factors like how efficiently the time, resources, quality and ultimately money is managed directly influence a company’s growth. Project Management is the blend of components like control, leadership and teamwork. Today, Project Management is a professional discipline with a body of knowledge and a specific set of skills.

A Project is successfully managed when the goals are achieved by the intelligent application of principles. Project Management opportunities not only exist for project managers but also for those who are part of a support team in a project or for team leaders with part of a project. Project Management is the model by which organization seeks to minimize the risks and costs of change, and maximize the benefits. Project Management takes strategic planning and proper implementation, which is possible only with proper training and knowledge.

The four basic elements of a project are as under

• Resources: It includes people, tools, and material
• Time: It includes job durations, and delays
• Money: It includes costs, losses, and profit
• Scope: It includes project size, goals, and necessities

Project management ensures that responsibilities are clearly defined and that resources are focusing on specified objectives. The project management process also provides a structure for communication within and across organizational boundaries. All the projects follow similar processes. This has led to the development of project management tools and techniques that can be applied to all projects.

Good planning is an essential criterion for a successful project management. A detailed and precise plan is the essential factor for successfully managing a project. Planning should also accommodate changes in environment. A person in charge of the project should continuously update their plan in line with recent changes. The process of project management includes defining the goals of the project, setting project objectives, specifying tasks based on the goals to be achieved, need of resources and budget, timelines and completion dates. Furthermore, proper project management includes implementing the project plan to make sure that each step is being properly followed. Highly organized would properly define a well-considered project management plan following carefully differentiated steps to complete the project. Feasibility studies would be the first step, followed by project planning then implementation, evaluation, and finally maintenance or support.

A quarterly global survey of hiring and firing trends covering more than 7000 organizations in 34 countries has found job prospects for professionals and managers improving for the first time since the autumn of 2008.

The Global Snapshot from an international recruitment firm asked 7397 companies in major markets such as western and eastern Europe, Africa, India, China and the USA whether they were currently hiring at professional and managerial level. It then asked whether they planned to do so in the coming quarter and whether they were currently letting staff go or were planning to do so in the next three months. Current hiring across the globe was up from 46% of respondents in the spring to 50% now. And the percentage of organizations intending to hire in the coming quarter was up from 44% to 48%. At the same time the percentage of organizations intending to shed staff had fallen from 35% in the spring to 25% now.

You have been worrying about handling a possible layoff and might be keeping an eye on the happenings in the job market. Not only you, is the market itself vigilant on the issue. Many surveys have been conducted in the past few months to gauge the impact of the recession on the Indian job market. It’s amazing to know how fast the scenario of job opportunities is changing!

In February 2009 India, the safest employment destination a survey by an HR consultancy firm, predicted in February that salaries would continue to rise at an average of 8.2% in 2009. It further said that India was one of the safest options for employments because only 16% of the Indian companies were considering layoffs as an option whereas 55% of the US companies and 30.6% of the Chinese companies were considering layoffs as the most viable option. The survey also projected that about 60% companies were still thinking of hiring new employees. 9 out of 10 companies were also giving promotions to the right candidates. In April 2009- Recruiters say no layoffs but freeze fresh hiring. Then came the survey report which said that most Indian companies were against layoffs but they had also stopped fresh hiring and staff incentives with a curb on outstation travel for executives. The information technology and outsourcing, which were the booming sectors of the past, had become more conservative with 84% recruiters stating that there will be no more hiring.

And now comes the latest report of the survey conducted by Naukri.com which has brought some relief by stating that 44% of recruiters predict addition of new jobs. The hiring scenario of industries such as pharmacy & medical, construction & engineering and telecom is positive where over 50% of the recruiters are planning to create new jobs during 2009. About 15% recruiters from IT industry indicated that there is no possibility of recruitment during the year, while 4% went off to say that there would be layoffs.

Current India hiring levels are up to 51% from 29%. The hiring and firing of staff is one of the most effective measures of business confidence and there is no denying that, with a few exceptions, the jobs market for professionals and managers is improving all around the world.