Building future-proof products for an evolving ecosystem

In the recent past, there has been a paradigm shift in the way businesses are done. Customers are driving the business and, the pandemic has further triggered it. Businesses around the world are focused on developing customer-focused software. This trigger is pushing leaders even further to change the entire software product engineering approaches and cultures. Market studies suggest that there has been a whopping 7-year increase in the pace at which companies are developing their products and leveraging their services. Thriving in a volatile economic environment requires new strategies and practices. Technology is no more just a source of cost efficiencies; it is now a strategic business component.

Personalization backed with a customer-driven approach is significantly improving customer experience through data and automation. It is helping organizations achieve higher revenue. Leading organizations are building intelligence by mapping user journeys with their behavior and are leveraging Product Engineering Services  (PES) to intensify personalization.

Accelerate, Innovate, and Learn

Technology modernization and usage of intelligent tools are critical to software-enabled business. It enables leaders to act on and analyze the feedback received from different phases of the engineering lifecycle. It is crucial to building a Continuous Learning culture.   

Cloud-native architecture is further acting as a catalyst to build truly customer-centric platforms and solutions. Tech-savvy enterprises are building and re-designing platforms and products by leveraging SOA, API, microservices, and container-based deployments. Organizations can achieve their desired outcomes by leveraging a few constructs from the playbook: 

-Opt for prototype-based development as it helps engineering teams visualize the requirements and build the software in pieces

-Align business and technology goals right from the beginning

-Maintain quality with Shift-left and Shift-Right methodologies i.e., Agile Engineering and Engineering Operations

While using the power of agility, engineering teams must be mindful of maneuvering through the product journey before and after release. Traditionally, business initiatives were spaced out upfront with very detailed requirements and little room for change. The Agile process, however, accepts change and even expects it.

Teams are built as per Business need and Architectures NOT as per Org hierarchy

Modern-day architecture and solutions are Built to Change NOT built to last, as businesses today cannot afford to be hesitant to change. They must move faster; the minute they fail to do so, they’re out of the race. Customers expect products/platform to respond to changes swiftly, Customer-driven designs need different approach and Engineering leaders need to build teams that seamlessly meet the expectations. They need to enable Product, Development, QA, Security, and Operations to work concurrently for a product/platform. These teams need visibility across the lifecycle in addition to the modern-day tools that should be integrated into the ecosystem. These teams must have a customer-focus approach that diligently needs:

-Multifold increase in the number of releases

-Improved development and delivery efficiency (reduced Lead/Cycle times)

-Reduction in code defects

There is no doubt that the holy grail of PES is these efficient teams. Setting up the right engineering team requires right approach. Engineering leaders must move beyond the conventional ‘hierarchy’ structure and focus more on building the team as per Product Architecture. 

The trick to building these PES teams is endorsing a structure that will cater to each step of engineering a product, ideation to execution. Smart organizations realize that having a full stack and holistic mindset will elevate their capabilities rapidly. With the right team, they can accelerate and innovate faster.

The Social Media Principle (Social DevOps)

Social media has transformed the way we communicate, create, and collaborate. Organizations continue to showcase their brand value and culture by positioning themselves on various social platforms. It has become a key driver in software product innovation along with rooted Agile principles and practices to deliver in dynamic settings and parameters. Additionally, it is influencing the inward practices of agile engineering. Agile Culture is helping companies and enterprises to build customer-focused and customer-centric software at rapid pace with quality.

Social DevOps culture helps Agile teams to work in collaborative space. For example, updating ticket status, watching feeds on JIRA, following SMEs on Wiki, sharing your learnings on Wiki, being part of relevant groups, and even pushing small changes by creating PRs.

Product engineering companies can complement business growth and transform into digital and dynamic organizations with social DevOps.

KPIs are not Indicators; they are drivers

How quickly you are reaching the customer is driving the software-enabled business, customers are looking and expecting the changes as they use software and to manage the same It is critical to assess how flexible engineering teams are when it comes to delivering the updates and changes. Agility-driven software development ensures that the teams deliver the software swiftly without compromising the quality. Deployment frequency and MTTX helps engineering leaders to understand how engineering goals are aligned to business and customer experience. It’s not about velocity but the completeness and how quickly you can deploy the changes so that customers can use the same. KPIs not just give insights about stability and quality but also enable teams to build software that is customer-centric and customer-driven.

PES has become a significant growth driver of the future. However, most organizations are still hesitant to explore new technologies because of a lack of infrastructure and experience/skills. PES can enhance the prospects of any business. This futuristic technology utilizes the ingraining software and IT solutions with a mix of hardware components to build meaningful and innovative products for the organization.

While we have accelerated pace because of the pandemic, PES will continue to bring in a lot of extensive integration of new-age technology stack into traditional product development practices.

The article is authored by Debasis Ray, SVP - Technology & Product Engineering, Cybage