www.ceotodaymagazine.com What is your process when it comes to identifying an organisation’s software failings and systems that might be streamlined? Failing is an absolute, so let’s use shortcomings instead. The business is likely starting to feel a need to evolve, which usually means scaling to more users or being able to add more functionalitywith less cost. These are the common streamlining efforts that every business must encounter during their growth evolution. In this way, the biggest shortcoming of any software system is its inability to support future growth in the business. This is akin to a bodybuilder hitting a plateau, not being able to get bigger or stronger. When I am asked to help in these situations I always ask about the next milestones for the business and how those milestones are measured. These milestones are important for software systems because they are the boundary conditions for performance. If the business is trying to double its revenue, then we need to know how the revenue is calculated and then what channels contribute to those calculations. Once we have that enumeration we can focus on the software components that support the channels. The harder problems to solve involve the marketing teams. Sometimes the business is stagnant and there is a need to attract a new set of users. The software will need to have new functionality, or it will need to rebrand the functionality it has. This kind of refactoring takes a lot of time and effort, spanning multiple business divisions, and has the highest risk of failure. Following on from this, how do you work to develop bespoke solutions to these issues? We have to know how we can customise the software for the business. Often the business is using an off-the-shelf solution that is no longer adequate for them. When that happens we look for ways to customise the software. If that can’t bedone, then we look for a way to encapsulate the software with another system that can be customised. If neither of those options is possible, then we need to write a new solution from scratch. There are times when we have to reverse engineer an interface to existing software. That’s never Jacob Anderson President & CEO at Beyond Ordinary Software Solutions 28
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