Traditionally, digital systems have been viewed through the lens of unique and siloed projects, with the development of new apps and systems seen as singular ventures. Today, however, leading organizations are rethinking the project-centric approach and instead viewing key business systems and processes as products that are constantly enhanced and refined.
This makes sense for many reasons. The product focus aligns better with modern DevOps practices that support continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD). The team can develop a more realistic and effective schedule for feature additions or changes than was possible with the waterfall approach. Back then, the tendency was to try to cram all the desired features into the next release, which expanded the scope of the project and lengthened the time necessary to complete it. Taking a product-centered view makes it possible to prioritize and time new features better. And given the regular cadence of CI/CD, it is much simpler to react to a competitive or market change that demands a new capability that was not foreseen and needs to be delivered more quickly.
The product approach also gives more permanence to the team that is driving the effort. When the team feels like it’s part of a continuing effort, it is more likely to stay connected and involved, with a greater sense of collective responsibility for delivering improved versions of the code.
But that doesn’t mean that a product-focused approach will increase reliance on in-house staff. Working within the context of a product plan makes it far easier to leverage managed service providers to deliver specific skills or services and to decide what should be done in-house and what should be done by a managed service provider. A managed service provider can add skills for the newest technologies and tools before in-house staff can learn how to use them. And using a quality managed service brings in an external perspective that can improve decisions about how the product should evolve.
Supporting this kind of new thinking about how to deliver the most modern digital systems is a focus of Maverick Technology Partners. The ability to deploy agile methods that deliver continuous improvement and support the ability to better evolve core systems will be the hallmark of successful firms. For more information on how we can partner with your firm to deploy a new product-centric development approach, please check out: https://www.mavericktechnologypartners.com.