Information technology was created to extend human abilities and to automate boring and repetitive tasks. IT frees humans to do the things they are good at, like thinking and adapting. Humans are built to like change and dislike the monotonous. For this reason, companies spend lots of money trying to figure out how to hold the attention of the masses and how to sell better, recruit better and capture more.
The king needs new knights who do not need armour as their first line of defence or offence.
Hardy Jonck heads up DVT's Mendix business unit.
Yet the systems they build are inherently static, cast in IT concrete of data schemas, workflow, form and data validation. Their excited young developers promise that ever-elusive “flexibility” that will deliver a “configure once and get your new change quickly” framework - a knight without shining armour.
Those who have been through this and felt the pain of buying a solution that meets 70% to 90% of requirements, do so in the hope that they might teach the new gentleman their dialect and court manners. He just might end up stealing hearts for a time. However, it soon becomes apparent that his outdated tactics do not deliver the punch his sponsors intended. He lacks diplomacy and agility. He may still be able to deliver a heavy-hitting punch, provided his maintenance is taken care of, but he needs the services of the trendy guys in tailored Italian suits to form new alliances and capture attention. These guys like change. They can switch diplomatic ties to win the war without a battle, and bring prosperity with a handshake.
Current development methodologies are mostly centred on object-oriented development, which itself builds on object-oriented analysis and design where problems are labelled with nouns and related verbs, which are then strung together in different layers to provide a solution to the problem.
Suited up for battle
The knights that wield the object-oriented armour tend to be optimised for delivering the core punch required in the ranks. Their manoeuvrability is low, because the nouns and verbs are tightly coupled into layers and have to offer heavy protection to maintain the ranks and flank. They can deliver a focused punch, but they are not agile and do not change as new tactics are required. They often promise to deliver re-usable weapons, but these never materialise.
Sadly, the lead knight becomes bored when the fort is scaled and the other knights are not interested in maintaining his flawed siege weapons. Besides, a different toolset will be required to conquer the next castle, and the last knight's light armour has no shine to it anymore. The cost of maintenance has become too high and the king and lords are missing the lost flexibility they were promised.
The king needs new knights who do not need armour as their first line of defence or offence. They know how to move on higher planes of abstraction, to listen to the dealmakers of the day, and seek to understand before they swing the sword. They like to win the war without a battle, and to deliver business value. They have the ability to steer the armies and listen to the feedback from intelligence officers and logistics.
Ciao old knight
In short, they have a different mindset that helps the kingdom to prosper and use the current assets to a maximum and to change tactics quickly. These are the knights in Italian suits. Their new approach leverages the older established weapons, but builds on them by listening, understanding and delivering value rather than a crushing blow.
If the older knights represent the established development environments like Java and .NET, and the hard hitting siege weapons represent the ERP systems, the knights in Italian suits represent those that wield new technologies and methods to deliver value.
Notably, model-driven development technologies are designed to leverage the existing tool chains, but to quickly assemble solutions based on their business users' and clients' requirements. Model-driven development will continue to deliver new frameworks that allow a new breed of expert to assemble their solutions by focusing more on the solution than the scaffolding. They are trained to listen to business and understand the business value they must deliver.
Model-driven development frameworks will be sold as a service, marketed under various names to appeal to the non-technical, delivering them from older, inflexible systems while retaining the best elements of the old. Otherwise, the older knights will feel threatened and never allow them to enter.
Set a watch on the wall, and look out for them. They might be impostors, but they may just deliver the city without a war. It's worth a try.