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What is Impact Analysis?
What is Impact Analysis?

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Impact analysis is the study of requirements data to understand the pros and cons of any change. As the world evolves, changes are to be expected, even in a well-developed system.

Changes can happen for various reasons: a difference in a client's requirements, adjustments to business needs, or new technologies.

Since changes can potentially fail, it is prudent to proceed with proper planning when making necessary changes.

Enter 'Impact Analysis.'

This technique helps identify the consequences of any changes planned in software or a product.

How is Impact Analysis Done?

There is a simple procedure to be followed for successful Impact analysis:

  1. View the change request and check its feasibility in the system.
  2. Identify the sequence to perform a task and how to interrelate it with the current one.
  3. Change is a critical component of product evolution.
  4. Identify the effects of the change request.
  5. Identify the change request's priority.
  6. Analyze and document the outcome.

Once completed, the impact analysis report is shared with all stakeholders to determine if they should support the change.

The Importance of Impact Analysis

Impact Analysis provides a better overall understanding of the change request and system and reveals potential issues before taking action.

For example, let us assume that an unexpected disaster necessitates a location change. In this instance, impact analysis can help the management understand the cost of fixing the situation and reveal the best way to move forward.

But impact analysis can help in making business decisions too. When a company faces a significant change, impact analysis can help lend clarity before making impactful decisions.

An impact analysis also helps understand the possible outcomes of implementing the change request. By observing results, the user can predict the product's overall performance after making a change.

In software, this analysis can help identify all the files, documents, and models that may be affected.

Based on this information, the development team may decide to make certain modifications to make the change implementation smoother.

The analysis also helps estimate the effort needed to implement the change. It helps identify the tasks required to implement the change correctly.

What are the Things You Put in an Impact Analysis Document?

It is not always essential to document the analysis formally with checkpoints. But a few checkpoints are applicable in showcasing the impact of a change request:

  • Description of an issue(Change request)
  • Change request ID
  • Title
  • Description
  • Prepared date
  • Estimates: This includes relative benefitrelative penaltyrelative cost, and relative risk
  • Estimated total efforts: Time in hrs
  • Estimated lost efforts: Time in hrs
  • Estimated Schedule impact: in days
  • Quality impacted
  • Another requirement affected
  • Another task impacted
  • Integration issues

Requirements changes are a part of the development cycle. The concerned stakeholders coordinate with software engineers to identify the requirements defects and changes, add new requirements, and prioritize said requirements.

In product development, surprises are rarely good news. Before a developer says, "Sure, no problem" in response to a change request, he or she should spend a little time on impact analysis.

Identifying the requirements and features needing a retest after a change is made is vital. While skipping impact analysis won't alter the size of the task, it turns size into a surprise.

Author — Ayushi Gupta, DLT Labs

About the Author: Ayushi has a Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science and has experience in various aspects of Business Analysis.


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