Tag Archives : Agile

The Lean Startup approach to managing the uncertainty of creation contains hidden gems that seamlessly harness the most powerful risk management techniques helpful to anyone trying to create something new.

The sense of freedom in a start-up (or incubation) environment is incredibly exciting. However, it is very easy to let this freedom lead you down the path of “what if”, distracting you from achieving success. You only have – at most – three years (many would argue two) to go from spending the “first opportunity dollar” to demonstrating commercial success. This leaves little room for distraction. Over many successes and failures, I found three things separated ventures that went on to commercial success from those that simply remained “interesting ideas.”

When a new, hot technology appears, it is easy to jump on the bandwagon and focus solely implementing it for your enterprise. However, if you do this you are likely to only do just that, deliver new technology. To use technology to create business value you have start by putting your finger on a problem to solve (then providing all that is needed – technology and otherwise) to solve this problem…

Correct isolation of logic in your applications can enable them to “turn on a dime,” rapidly adapting to changing business rules and requirements. Placing logic in the wrong places can lead to spaghetti, long test cycles or (even worse) complete breakage of your data model. This is why “Isolation of Logic by Type” is an architecture principle I live by–even if many of my vendors do not…

Use of modularity and encapsulation if one of the most powerful approaches to scaling architecture (your ability to built it, your cost to operate it–AND the value you can obtain from it). Those enterprises who incorporate this into the DNA of their technology create “killer networks” that can used to generate enormous value…

Based on best practices from RAND and proven with first-hand experience on over $500 million of public and private sector programs, the decision-based government model is an efficient way to implement large, complicated “high change” programs in manner that ensures accountability to all critical stakeholders and creates a culture of ownership and adoption…