In this blog post
Citizen Developers
The world runs on apps and the business world is no exception. However, taking the traditional app development route may no longer be efficient in the current era. The software development process takes a good amount of time which can range from months to even years. Depending on the overburdened developers may not be a good option, when businesses need quick turnaround.
With limited resources, citizen developers can fulfill the demand for developing an app quicker. According to Gartner, by 2023 there will be four times more citizen developers than traditional programmers in large enterprises. Around 20% of the large enterprises are exploring the potential citizen developers while 40% already initiated it as per the survey.
It helps the businesses as well as IT teams to collaborate with those on the business side to build apps or new functionalities of existing apps.
Who are Citizen Developers?
By using no-code and low-code programs, non-professional developers and business users can build apps with no or limited experience of coding. These non-professional developers are called Citizen Developers. The GUI-based platforms help these no/low coders to develop a solution without much coding.
Advantages of Citizen Developers
- Advancement and Creativity: Being a business user or external facing team members, these citizen developers have more insights into the potential process improvement and thus drive advancement/enhancement with creative thinking.
- Time: The turn-around time (TAT) gets shorter when non-IT employees of an organization pitch in to develop apps for various business requirements.
- Improvement: The quick feedback from the colleagues on the requirement help these citizen developers to make necessary changes or enhancements rather than depending on the professionals.
- Proprietary Rights: Companies have resources readily available and hence they become proprietary for the organization without depending on any third-party integration. These will lead to optimum utilization of current resources, without going outside their pre-approved applications and server.
- Financial Benefits: In-house developed apps provide cost-effective solutions, boost training, and improve technical efficiency. Hence, leading to less or no dependency on the third-party platforms.
- Scaling: The customization based on the existing business environment will scale the solutions because of the people within the environment.
Types of apps build by Citizen Developers
There are multiple application approaches one can plan or delegate to these citizen developers. It helps to build structure. The delegation of work can be done based on business requirements. It can be a single department or a particular business unit application. The type of work can be distributed like database management, flow apps, approval flow process, or single enhancement. The mere delegation of the app can be considered by the users i.e. external stakeholders, internal stakeholders, or both.
According to the survey by Gartner with 55 participants in 2019, top cases are
- Data Collections Apps and Survey Forms (58%)
- Apps that organize business processes and workflows within apps (49%).
- Apps that automate by replacing paper, email, or spreadsheets (42%)
Steps to encourage Citizen Developers in an Organization
- Culture Development: The first step is to foster a culture that gives the freedom to take risks and encourages experimenting. This will in turn create a culture of innovation. It will also help to create an environment for succeeding in business intelligence.
- Educate, Spread Awareness, and Motivate: Educating the team/employees will provide them with an environment that boosts creativity and ideas for business development. Motivating them for the best solution to the problem will define their existence in the organization. Ideas and innovation will ensure long term success of an organization.
- Goals and Expectations: Along with the motivation, these citizens need a helping hand from the IT professionals in terms of guidance. This will ensure effectiveness of application development. The goals should be set with clear expectations from the citizen developers. Setting the relevant targets and expectations for citizen developers will make it easier for them to accept the demands of learning and using low code platforms.
- Roadmap: With proper analysis of the business needs and benefits, a clear roadmap for improvement should be planned. Areas of business improvement should be identified for optimization. Based on the capable employees, prioritize the departments. It will deliver success and motivate others to join the movement and follow their lead.
- Identification of the right Low/No code platform: Identification of the correct platform is very important for citizen developers. It should complement the business requirement and its development. In absence of this step, the functionality and uses will be difficult to manage. When deciding the platform, the security factor should also be taken into consideration along with its features and cost. Many Low/No code platform works on usage-based pricing model.
- Recognition of Citizen Developers: A successful identification, development, and implementation will prove beneficial to the business. They saved the time, cost, and resources of the organization. Proper analysis of the benefits should be framed post every enhancement/application. The documentation will help define the success story and provide recognition to these citizen developers. Recognition will motivate more step forward and put their efforts in taking up app development.
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