14. The Art of Software Development

I was ruminating over my participation in the Information Technology sector for over 2 decades. I have player several roles – some formal and some informal – Software Engineer, Programmer Analyst, full stack developer, Senior Associate, Project Manager, Technical Architect, Solution Architect, Enterprise Architect, Business Analyst, Technical Analyst, Technical content creator, Train the trainer architect etc.,

I have seen how the product and application creation cycles along with IT project management and Devops culture has evolved over a period. And I thought of writing this blog focussing on a enterprise class software product creation effort.

Please refer to this article for additional information - https://www.mayoan.com/technology/13.-starting-an-it-company .

Management Efforts:

It all starts with management needs. Say for example, the management sees a strategic risk of their information systems not in a modern state and hence is not scalable as per the potential calculated.

Some of the strategic risks that may be considered by the board, governance and management are:

• Competitive pressure

• Emerging new markets

• Emerging new products

• Financial stress

• Mergers & Alliances

• Sell offs and divestitures

• Emerging new marketing channels

• Changing economic landscapes

• Changing legal/regulatory environments

• Technological/scientific breakthroughs

• Black swan events

• Changing demands

• Zeitgeist

• Global Events of significance

So, they create a program charter and allocate a budget for the entire program and duration. Quick roles and responsibilities along with management level RACI matric is created. The IT committee, CxOs including CIOs and CTOs sign off on the charter. This charter is then given to the CIO/CTO to draw the stages and boundaries at a higher level.

The program tracking will be on a on-going basis.

The CIO/CTO Efforts:

Program/Project kick-off, allocating senior roles and responsibilities, management reporting cadence, Infosec Policy to be followed, CyberSec Policy to be followed, Data Security and Privacy Policy to be followed, Program risk assessments and cadence, Enterprise frameworks, Industry standards and guidelines etc., are all finalized and the WIP moves to the Chief Enterprise Architect in-charge. Interface with other horizontals and BUs are fine-tuned or upgraded.

The task is then handed over to the Program management team.

The program tracking will be on a on-going basis.

Some of the technical risk areas handled by this offices includes:

• Aligning the IT strategies to the company strategies

• Avoiding being technically outdated

• Intelligently adopting the latest trends to the benefit of the company and its businesses

• Continually upgrading the cybersec operations as per the industry norms

• Continually upgrading the knowledge management processes and platforms as per the latest industry norms

• Strategizing on outsourcing/off-shoring and other hybrid models

• Developing policies related to subject areas such as WFH, device management (BYOD included), Training costs, certifications and certificates, on-site/off-site meetings, etc.,

• Choosing and adopting the right frameworks and guidelines as harnesses for the IT function

• Keeping a check on any potential threats emerging from legal complications in areas such as IPRs.

The Program Management Team (PMT) Efforts:

The PM team assembles the rest of the team; Necessary trainings are organized. All needed resources are on-boarded as per the team loading plan. Necessary software, hardware and licenses are obtained. VMs, MSCs, Physical security, logical security etc., as per the relevant policies are arranged. Roles and responsibilities are assigned. Project plans, Product back logs etc., are drawn up. Scrum ways of working perhaps was also planned to be adopted. Other aspects such as requirements(epics, stories, requirements, product backlogs, scrum logs etc.,), time sheet management, account management, management reporting, revenue recognition, project/program expense tracking, HRD, other stake holder management, program risk management, quality management, delivery management etc are handled by this team and they may use and enforce the use of project tracking software for plans, requirements, time sheets, accounts, budgeting, collaboration, communications, presentations and travel & leisure. Frameworks like PMP, ITIL, Prince 2, SAFe, etc., may be adopted by this team.

https://algocademy.com/blog/79-essential-tips-for-succeeding-in-collaborative-coding-projects/

The program tracking will be on a on-going basis. Based on the decisions above the PMT then delegates the task to other program managers(s), project managers(s), product managers(s), business analysts, etc.,

Some of the project risk areas tackled by PMT are:

• Cost control and budgeting

• Scheduling

• Quality management

• Delivery metrics

• Mile-stones and scoping related

• Project resource management

• Team performance evaluation related

• Team morale related

• Stakeholder management

• Communication strategies

• Documentation

• Takeovers and Handoffs

• Team skills upgrade and update related

• Quality checking of processes (like QM, devops, scrum, lean, etc.,) under execution with continuous improvements

• Third party engagements

• Maintaining approved list of vendors