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this is simultaneously a valid reason not to use low code tools - and why they find favour in many organisations. >In such an environment, creating an "example
by spinningslate 3y ago
this is simultaneously a valid reason not to use low code tools - and why they find favour in many organisations.
>In such an environment, creating an "example project" that contains all of the scaffolding required and just writing that sign on form is going to take waaaaay less time than even initial planning how to integrate the "no code" tool into our processes.
I've also seen the opposite. Someone in the org wants a simple site. Maybe a sign up form, or CMS/wiki for internal docs, etc. The dev team says "sure, that'll be 6 months". A large part of which is constrained capacity - the devs need to fit it in alongside a buch of other stuff. Another part is tech choice: the corporate stack uses e.g. React on the front end, calling web services written in Java, backed off to Postgres for storage (or whatever). The devs estimate for building the CMS/wiki/whatever from scratch - because it has to fit the tech stack.
At that point the (internal) customer screws up their face and utters all the familiar frustrations about "IT". Someone somewhere mentions to them that there's a way to sidestep it all, and do it yourself. In their position it's very hard not to see that alternative as attractive.
It's a hard problem. That same internal customer will similtaneously rail against the recharge in their budget for IT. It's a cost: a drag on their P&L. IT says they're under-resourced, and they could do it quicker with more people - but that would increase the P&L drag. Vicious circle.
Software is a sociotechnical endeavour yet we too often focus on the technical and ignore the social aspect. Yet "Low Code" and similar emanate primarily from the social side. Coming back to your post though, not exclusively. Development teams can be equally culpable when zeroing in on tech stacks that aren't a good fit for the problems at hand. Or, perhaps, stacks that are a good fit for the problems they were chosen to solve - but not so much when the new requirement comes along.
Of course, low code is no panacea either. Most non-technologists have no perception of the need for ongoing evolution, even if there's no new feature development. Patching/upgrading is a must. And new features always emerge - most after the original "citizen developer" has moved on / lost interest / whatever. So the whole shebang gets foisted on IT, who are expected to operate and maintain it. Usually with no tests, automated builds, documentation, ...
It's pernicious. At heart, though, it's primarily a social problem that needs a good underlying relationship between the customers/users and the developers. It's Conway's Law. Of course tech choice still matters. But no tech stack is going to magic away problems rooted in organisational friction.
- joshheyse 3y ago> It's a hard problem. That same internal customer will similtaneously rail against the recharge in their budget for IT. It's a cost: a drag on their P&L. IT says they're under-resourced, and they could do it quicker with more people - but that would increase the P&L drag. Vicious circle. I started my career as a Solutions Consultant. Our primary customers were small business units in large organizations that were frustrated with “IT” and looked externally to solve their problem. Low code is a variation on this strategy. Our delivery time estimates always beat IT estimates and our costs were often less. Maybe because we were seen as a competitor to IT, or maybe some manager was being sneaky our first interactions with IT was usually after the engagement contract was signed. (None of these projects had RFP/RFQs) During the discussions with IT was when the hard parts of the engagement really happened. It was then we learned about the compliance requirements. Security, data integrity, availability, platform standards, ci/cd, pmi, etc…. These unknowns often dragged out our delivery times and skyrocketed our billable hours. Putting us equal to or behind internal IT. In my experience at large organizations Compliance is more closely aligned with legal than IT but is often an a function of IT. The rules set forth by the legal teams are enforced through technical/process controls by IT. This makes IT look like the ‘problem’ went in fact they are just following mandates set forth be legal. It’s often easy for a business unit to complain about IT preventing revenue growth and get an exception. If a business unit complained to upper management that legal wouldn’t let them do something I doubt exceptions would be granted as easily. I’d suggest that compliance be its own department and review all external tools or vendors instead of IT. This would put external consultants or low-code solutions on par with internal IT. If would also shortened the feedback loop between those creating the rules and those it causes grief.