Citizen Development: You say you want a revolution…
Who doesn’t know and love the Beatles song, Revolution, sung beautifully by John Lennon?
“You say you want a revolution(1)
Well, you know
We all want to change the world
You tell me that it's evolution(2)
Well, you know
We all want to change the world”
And then he goes on by singing...
“You say you got a real solution(3)
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan
You ask me for a contribution(4)
Well, you know
We're all doing what we can”
Who knew the Revolution that John, Paul, George and Ringo sang was synonymous with the digital revolution that many public sector agencies and corporations face today? The digital revolution(1) has already manifested itself in many forms, such as cloud computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, artificial intelligence, robotic process automation, quantum computing, and 3d printing - which are already changing the world. They show great promise in cost avoidance, saving money, improving customer satisfaction, providing life-saving products, improving efficiency and effectiveness, and identifying fraud, waste, and abuse, to name a few.
Because of the complexity and sheer volume of the programs the Chief Information Offices (CIO) are supporting, they are shifting their role -- from simply purchasing licenses and trying to be everything to everyone -- to that of a trusted advisor, aiding the program and business offices with their strategic decisions regarding technologies. However, these technologies are often not understood by the program and business offices because they are described to them in 1s and 0s (aka super techie talk), yet they are now responsible for the execution. As such, an emerging trend called “Citizen Development” is now flourishing in the marketplace as not only non-IT folks are getting very comfortable configuring low code and no-code platforms to meet their business needs but also as agencies look to address the high cost of contracted enhancement and operations and maintenance (O&M) costs.
Unfortunately, it is these citizen developers that do not have all the necessary skills to be successful; they often have a strength in one area (i.e., deep understanding of the environment or excellent technical skills) but are weak in other areas (i.e., requirements development, product development, user-centered design, and technology nuances). So as these technologies are getting evaluated and adopted, the organizations need an evolution(2) focused on training their workforce to not only embrace the change that is coming but also become an advocate for that change, which is critical to implementing new solutions.
To address this shift from the CIO to the program or business office and the emergence of “Citizen Development,” a real solution(3) is needed to support the digital transformation revolution and evolution - that solution being Citizen Developer Technologist training. Imagine {yes, I’m throwing in another Beatles song} a curriculum where your Citizen Developer team has the capability to:
● Translate the technical jargon into layman’s terms and practical examples (for example, instead of saying “Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is a software technology that emulates humans actions that will improve customer satisfaction,” describe it in real terms like, “instead of manually entering data from a form into your system, you simply scan it and the data you need is automatically populated into your system -- well that’s an example of RPA!”)
● Identify desired and quantifiable business outcomes (for example, instead of saying, “the claims process will be improved as a result of this technology,” be concrete and confident - “the claims backlog will be reduced by 15% in 3 months” or “the claims agent will reduce their review time from 5 days to 2 days”)
● Understand and incorporate human-centered design principles (for example, instead of making sure the requirements were configured correctly, ask yourself whether your aging relative or family member could easily use the system/product without contacting their grandchild for support)
Citizen Development is not going away anytime soon. So, why not help them achieve a higher probability of success and invest in teaching them to be better Citizen Developer Technologists? The contribution(4) ushered in by this new way of thinking could be dramatic.
First, who better to solve your digital transformation challenges than those Citizen Developers on the ground who have a connection and relationship with the end user? Citizen Developers have the ability to conduct pilots, ensuring they and the end users are confident and comfortable that the technology will meet their needs - all the while not spending millions of dollars and wasting thousands of hours as a result of potentially picking the wrong solution that has bad requirements with little to no user engagement. Secondly, after a minimum viable product (MVP) or proof-of-concept is developed, most agencies transition these products to a system integrator (SI) who has the expertise and scale to deploy complex enterprise-wide solutions. The transition from Citizen Developer to the SI will be much smoother because the Citizen Developers who supported the MVP/pilot should now be included in the Integrated Project Team where they can freely leverage their knowledge. Thirdly, after the solution is deployed, operations and maintenance can be shifted back to the Citizen Developers as they already have an understanding of the solution and have been involved in the project from the onset. This last part results in real cost savings and cost avoidance as agencies can spend their limited financial resources on creating more impactful products. Finally and perhaps most importantly, a Citizen Developer Technologist can leverage their holistic view of the entire program to not only address the limited supply of skilled experts but also break down the silos between the end user and the SI that often plague large complex implementations.
With a Citizen Developer Technologist training, “Don’t you know it’s going to be...alright...alright...alright”