IT Employment

The starting point usually depends on whether your department charges time back to the requesting user's department or not. If you do, estimate the time it will take to complete the request and inform the requestor. They may well choose not to proceed.

Next you have to establish some criteria around prioritizing requests. Obviously the work effort to complete the request gives you one part of the equation. Start with some fairly general categories, e.g. <5 days, 5-10 days, 10-30 days & over 30 days. That will give you an idea of the size of the thing. Impacts are usually the next thing to look at; will the change affect others or just the requestor? Is some kind of approval required for the change?

Then we come onto benefits. Obviously hard financial ones are best, e.g. reducing head count through increased efficiency, but many are soft. Either way, write them out.

My preferred method at that point is to have some kind of user group that involves people from all departments. Usually you will find you have more requests than time so decisions have to be made about what to do and what to drop. Don't put yourself in the middle of this one - let the users decide and sign off on the priorities. You can facilitate.

I recommend also putting in place an escalation procedure should the user group be unable to agree. Unfortunately, this is going to happen...

Hope this helps...