The art of business transformation has a long history of mediocre success as companies have attempted to make great changes for quality and efficiency and to contend with significant movements in the market. As we'll explore in this Executive Update, the same forces pressing companies to react more swiftly fortunately are also providing new ways to support and energize enterprise redirection.

The art of business transformation has a long history of mediocre success as companies have attempted to make great changes for quality and efficiency and to contend with significant movements in the market. As we'll explore in this Executive Update, the same forces pressing companies to react more swiftly fortunately are also providing new ways to support and energize enterprise redirection.

About two decades ago I thought I had a handle on big data. I was doing some data warehousing work with a telephone utility that had about 100 million transactions. That was a lot of data, I said to myself.

Outsourcing typically starts as an economic decision but is not limited to it.

People were always mobile. Even more so after the transportation revolution that started with Ford and others.

People were always mobile. Even more so after the transportation revolution that started with Ford and others.

We've observed that architecture in the enterprise is still an evolving discipline. We saw how the reality and the words that purport to be tags for the reality might be two entirely different things. If the word-reality gap is true of architecture in general, is it not reasonable to expect this to be so with "solution architecture" and "solution architect," too?

Your organization has decided that it wants to build a mobile application. Congratulations! Here in Part I of this Executive Update series, we'll start with the very first stages of planning and discovery, while future Updates will address the rest of the project's lifecycle, including Agile development, Lean product design, user interface/user experience (UI/UX), resources and capabilities required, estimation, and major architectural concerns such as scalability and mobile security.

Developments in technology and business are occurring at an ever-increasing pace, creating continuous shortages of available talent. Nowhere is this truer than in the analytics sector. New ideas do not necessarily require new hiring, but they do need more education.

Developments in technology and business are occurring at an ever-increasing pace, creating continuous shortages of available talent. Nowhere is this truer than in the analytics sector. New ideas do not necessarily require new hiring, but they do need more education.

If you've read the last few of my Advisors on Google Glass and Babel fish, you will have noticed that I've been more than a little overwhelmed by the speed with which technological change is outstripping my limited sci-fi-augmented imagination. Some of the products that I was forecasting to be years away (like real-time translation of speech in one language to another) are actually going to be available (in beta form, at least) as early as the end of this year. So the possibilities are really getting interesting.

For teams tasked with developing an organization's enterprise systems, there are extra issues to consider in addition to those encountered in a business-to-consumer context. For starters, any such project will have political and cultural repercussions. In business, there is generally a tacit understanding that the feelings that make people say and do things -- really -- are undiscussable. As a pungent blog post on the subject of corporate culture recently observed:

The reality of today's highly competitive and customer-demand-centric market conditions have pushed software (solution) delivery organizations beyond the traditionally accepted limits of software development and delivery capabilities. There is no argument that Lean methodologies such as Lean Six Sigma and DevOps can help improve operational solution delivery capacities through:

This Executive Report discusses the challenges and the value of using Agile methods in outsourced projects. The use of Agile -- with its focus on individuals, their interactions, working solutions, and acceptance of change -- can help reduce cultural and regional barriers in an outsourced/offshored environment. The Composite Agile Method and Strategy (CAMS) presents a balanced, strategic approach to Agile and can enhance collaboration, reduce method friction, and provide value to all parties.

 Outsourcing, by its very nature, is driven by planning, contracts, processes, and deliverables. Once Agile is understood and accepted as a strategy and a culture rather than just as a method for developing software solutions, it can play a substantial role in reducing cultural and regional barriers in an outsourced/offshored environment.

The new buzzword for measures for improvement is "analytics." Unfortunately, there is no new thinking to go along with the new name. Many leaders still go about getting, analyzing, and using measures in the wrong way. Rather than being the "leader," they fall back into the role of doer. It's a fascinating phenomenon.

The new buzzword for measures for improvement is "analytics." Unfortunately, there is no new thinking to go along with the new name. Many leaders still go about getting, analyzing, and using measures in the wrong way. Rather than being the "leader," they fall back into the role of doer. It's a fascinating phenomenon.

That may not apply to B2B clients who usually have a burgeoning set of expectations of the service provider. Inability to manage expectations can hurt the service provider's client relationships. This Advisor examines the nature of client expectations in a B2B landscape and proposes actions to manage these very expectations.

Two trends are driving the need for transparency in enterprise applications:

In this special double issue of Cutter IT Journal, we endeavor to examine the correlation between empathy and the practices surrounding the systems development lifecycle (SDLC). Our goal is to demonstrate the benefits that an empathy-based approach can bring to the SDLC and the way that IT leaders interact with their internal customers and constituents.

I worked for several years as a consultant to investment banks, helping them build or evaluate software systems to support traders, salespeople, and operations staff. During these experiences, one question in particular came to intrigue me.

The explosion of connected devices has set a new standard in consumer expectations, in that the "standard" is a moving target. Everything is connected, everything is digital, and everything is real time. There is no tolerance in the market for a company that produces great products but offers a poor service experience around that product or vice versa. The experience with your firm's products and services must be at least as good as the best experience a consumer has ever had with anyone else.

The explosion of connected devices has set a new standard in consumer expectations, in that the "standard" is a moving target. Everything is connected, everything is digital, and everything is real time. There is no tolerance in the market for a company that produces great products but offers a poor service experience around that product or vice versa. The experience with your firm's products and services must be at least as good as the best experience a consumer has ever had with anyone else.