INTRO – Information technology and digital services continue their march into every workplace and line of business. Driving progress are trends in development that make software more accessible, productive and deliver proven business benefits.
The Changing Landscape for Business Software
Continued cloud adoption, growing interest in AI and the rise of no/low-code services continue to drive software development trends. As more firms become digital businesses, software boosts productivity or helps automate more work processes. These and the push and pull of computing at the edge, centralisation and decentralisation, containerization help make software development an exciting landscape to be a part of. See “21 Predictions about the Software Development Trends in 2021” for a more detailed assessment of the ride we are on.
Cloud adoption might remove much of the need for traditional development services. And cloud domination is all but assured with “93 percent of enterprises have a multi-cloud strategy; 87 percent have a hybrid cloud strategy.” according to Flexera research. But application integration, customisation and the need for bespoke features sees developers in high demand to deliver the services that end-users need.
The rise of AI and machine learning are all part of the drive to solutions that create their own answers to solve business questions. That might be through analytics, deep learning and other processes, but again, most require coding and development expertise to bring these tools to a state where end-users can benefit.
Finally, no-code and low-code help bridge the gap between development and the end-user. Low-code can help programmers save time through rapid prototyping, while no-code enables professionals and knowledge workers to develop their own applications.
The rise of low code is highlighted by a DevOps Online piece that highlights the many advantages, including cost, speed, and maintainability. But for developers, the key benefit is that low-code allows programmers to focus more of their time on projects that add greater value.
The combined efforts of these trends only help to boost the value and importance of software within a business. Whatever the delivery method, or the trend, software development continues to adapt to deliver these business-critical services. For the software developer, they mean constant pressure to master new skills and services, and become a more integrated element within the business.
Software Development Continues to Evolve
In most modern businesses, software development continues to transition from a series of big-budget projects to a rolling cadence of improvement and support for ongoing evolution in support of business needs.
Across enterprise environments, developers continue to revamp legacy code, drive integration between software projects, all helping the business gain a better view over its data, and that constant push for better productivity.
While JavaScript remains the dominant language, and Python is a fast-growing favourite, the business sees only tools that meet their use cases. To help in the company improvement efforts, trends like agile and DevOps help maintain the tempo and increase the visibility of development operations, with a growing range of tools supporting these objectives.
The key driving force behind any business operation is consistent pressure for improved productivity. That goes for the efforts of software developers, as well as the tools that developers produce to improve business operations.
Improvements in Software Developer Recruitment
With software impacting all areas of a business, it is not hard to find examples playing a great role outside key developer tools. Another step along the path to better business results is a clearer view of the hiring and testing process for developers.
Increasingly, businesses and IT services are inter-linked to focus on that goal, with tools like Developer Analytics, This improves the effectiveness and transparency of day-to-day progress. It improves the standards of code, making projects easier to maintain while boosting the culture of a team or department to help deliver positive outcomes.
The use of Predictive Assessment is one of many improvements in human resources and hiring methodologies. While general recruitment processes are increasingly digital, using standardised chatbot interviews to blind recruitment to avoid bias, the process of hiring developers benefits from its own toolset.
Hiring managers using predictive assessment can identify candidates with the right skills and experience you require, reducing the early-stage load. Identifying better candidates means you are more likely to fill the role faster and tests that indicate workplace performance show how quickly they will be contributing value to the team and improving code quality,
The Race to Automated and Integrated Everything
If business leaders have their way, the IT landscape will soon see every digital asset connected to everything else. From applications and services to AI decision engines, and even the inevitable blockchain, the push for greater efficiency and a single overview of the business pushes developers to integrate.
We also need to be a part of the business, not on the outside, looking in. The rise of low-code and no-code will help developers understand the needs of end-users, and are not something to be treated as a threat. However, developers at all levels will need to be more visible to the business.
The value we add needs to increase in profile and the possibilities and business opportunities that developers can create are key to building a successfully integrated role in any organisation or partner.
Whatever part of the development sphere you work in, 2021 and beyond will be driven by that never-ending drive for business efficiency. That can come from software innovation as well as the grind of ever more efficient and effective processes.
The trick is to find the teams and people in the business who know what they need. Give them the tools to make the development process easier, and work across the business to build the services that have the greatest combined impact. That might be a world away from the legacy market of one tool for one task, but the results will far outstrip any business stuck in its traditional coding ways.