Help your staff and clients understand and apply a clear, testable algorithm for managing requirements—whether you’re doing a digital transformation, system integration, or just keeping the existing processes running smoothly. Below is your original text, revised for grammar, spelling, and clarity. You can drop it straight into your Knowledge Base or Company Blog.

Key Terms

• Hard Requirements
  Mandatory capabilities or constraints that directly match the documented status quo deliverables.
• Soft Requirements
  Optional enhancements or future features, scheduled via roadmaps.
• Roadmap
  A sequenced schedule of soft requirements and milestones, showing dependencies and timing.
• Scope Creep
  Any work added beyond the agreed-upon scope without formal change control.
• Digital Transformation (aka Digital Encoding)
  Replacing manual or paper-based inputs entirely with electronic capture—tablets, Arduino/ESP micro-controllers, barcode/QR scanners, OCR and handwriting-AI, edge AI image recognition, etc.
• System Integration
  A broader concept than digital transformation: any time a new process or system (software, hardware, AI) is linked into the existing workflow, so data and functions operate seamlessly together.
• Status Quo
  The current processes, functions, and features the end user experiences. Every step is documented: inputs, authorizing/checking personnel, tools used, and sample outputs. A complete status quo map is validated via a dry run, walking analysts through each input-output transformation.
• Outcome vs. Deliverable
  Outcome: What the client should be able to do or have once the project is complete.
  Deliverable: The tangible artifact (report, prototype, script) that demonstrates or enables the outcome.

Your Original Text, Polished

Outcome and Deliverables
We use “outcome” in conjunction with “deliverables” to clarify what the client should be capable of doing or have once the project is complete. It’s critical that, when planning this, we provide examples and frequently confirm—with prototypes and sample outputs—that the outcome and deliverable meet expectations.

For both status-quo and new processes, we:

1. Record existing competencies and capabilities.
2. Prototype the new process and outputs.
3. Present those outputs to end users for validation and verification.

Hard vs. Soft Requirements

Hard Requirements

• Must align exactly with the status quo deliverables.
• Anything outside that baseline is not a hard requirement.

Soft Requirements

• New features or workflow improvements beyond the status quo.
• Scheduled in a roadmap for later phases.

Scope Creep occurs when a digital transformation or system integration includes anything not in the replaced status quo—without formal approval.

Example: Hard vs. Soft

Roadmap

Once the system is digitally transformed, it’s easier to automate:

• ERPNext Reports
  Configure saved filters, scheduled reports, and custom scripts.
• Spreadsheets + Macros
  Pull data via API, process with pivot tables, run macros for quick turnarounds.
• Custom UIs (React Tables)
  Only after data is digitized—this is a soft requirement if you started with manual systems.

Milestones & Next Hard Requirements

Once the system is digitally transformed, it’s easier to automate:

• Milestone Structure
  – Week 1: Develop all hard requirements.
  – Week 2: QA, user demos, and handover.
• Parallel Work
  If budget and manpower allow, split hard/soft tasks across multiple teams to meet the two-week target or scale up scope.

Analysis & Demonstrations

Time to Demo
If a process takes 1 workday, allocate at least 1 workday to demo to analysts.

Sample Data
Clients provide anonymized data (sensitive info removed) so IT can build an accurate prototype and gain end-user sign-off.

Critical Takeaway: Managing Scope

By understanding hard requirements (the non-negotiable baseline) vs. soft requirements (the enhancements), and by using a clear roadmap and formal change control, your team—and your clients—can deliver projects on time, within budget, and without scope creep.