Innovating at no costs

This post is dedicated to those, who still think that innovation is a costly affair:

“I agree with you” -- is what I could say and that would sum it up. But most of my friends know that I don’t really agree to it.

As I have pointed out in my this post (http://itcit.blogspot.com/2008/07/cheating-innovation.html) , there are two types of innovators. Since we know that type 1 innovation is costlier than type 2 innovation, most businesses should actually go for first kind of innovation (‘Creation’) only when the second type (‘Application’) is not available. And yes it is quite possible that all your efforts and money spent on type 1 innovation goes in vain due to changes in market condition or due to someone else creating and launching a similar or better product before you do. However, type 1 innovation can give you massive returns (if type 2 innovation is also applied effectively on the product obtained from type 1 innovation) much more than what type 2 can give you.

In that sense, I would say Innovation (type 1) is like the stock market --- high risk, high return. If you are not looking for high returns, you can still get decent returns (in fact, better returns in turbulent times) from bonds/ deposits i.e. type 2 innovation.

Non-fluid employees of large corporations

Large corporations, be it IT or non-IT (I will talk more in terms of IT firms), have the tendency of making people stick or non-fluid i.e. the same group of employees (the entire hierarchy) carrying on from one project to another. Though restructuring and location-transfers help to certain extent, but the time period during which this stickiness develops is shortening. Yes, this helps the organization in a way (better bonding between team members since they have been working together for long), but it also creates a problem. With such clusters getting formed, you would either have to go for the complete cluster or nothing. Hence, the skill availability gets severely hit and, while the employee utilization levels remain low, there is always demand for people -- a fake demand due to artificially choked supplies.

Final word
I think though such stick clusters are good, however, these clusters should be broken at regular intervals in order to ensure better access to talent across the organization. One important break-point should be the allowed time-frame for the cluster to remain a cluster once it is on 'bench'.

Even big R&D firms choke innovation

Once a great business leader (who heads a multi-billion dollar company) was stuck with a business problem for which neither he nor his wise men could come up with a real good solution. He went on and poised the question (in a simplified form) to a group of young children at a school. Children exclaimed at the simplicity of the question. And soon Jack had the solution (rather multiple solutions) before him.
Moral of the story:
1) Think different. Don’t choke innovation. Float your problems (wherever possible) to larger group of brains – instead of limiting it to your (labelled) wise men

2) Collaborate and reach out: someone from outside your team/group might turn a seemingly difficult problem into a real easy one.

3) Appreciate the fact that different people see things differently and different thought processes could actually bring out totally different views

Hyped SaaS !! Can we have 'Kaas' too.

SaaS is fast getting popular just like anything that receives extensive hype. However, the good thing with such hyped concepts is that they bring to light the basics that have been kind-of forgotten (or not treated seriously enough). This (SaaS) is a case similar to design patterns (see http://itcit.blogspot.com/2008/06/invisible-design-patterns.html). The concept has always been there, it is just the hype that is new. There have been shared servers, shared telecon services, shared hosting services, and tremendous softwares have been developed in order to cater to niche needs of various business verticals and sub-verticals. All these are like SaaS in action (in a way). So, nothing new there.

Let me, however, take another slant on this one. Can we take some learning from the SaaS concept and start treating reuse and knowledge management (which are kind-of aimed to achieve similar purpose in their own earnest) more seriously. I am not saying that IT firms (especially large IT firms) are not taking KM and reuse seriously -- what I am saying is that there needs to be a more focused effort. Or to put it more simply -- let's create a hype around KM+resuse. Should I call it 'KaaS' -- knowledge as a service?

SaaS: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_as_a_Service

Cheating = Innovation

Consider this:
Innovator 1: The person who conceives the idea e.g. the person who thought of and created the first internet networking website but made almost no money from it*
Innovator 2: The person who copied this idea and raked in millions through it.

We are labeling a copy-cat as innovator...Foolish - Isn’t it? But that is true, innovation has many dimensions (broadly 2 dimensions) – Innovator 1 was great on the ‘Creation’ aspect while Innovator 2 was great on the ‘Application’ aspect.

Can we say Innovator 1 > Innovator 2 or the other way round?
Well, it really depends on what objective these innovators had in mind and were they able to achieve those objectives. However, for most businesses, Innovator 2 would be better than Innovator 1 because the inherent objective of most businesses is to make money.

So, innovation (of type 2) might not actually be a big ticket item as most people think it to be.

* This is just an example and doesn’t refer to any person in the real world

No one wants to join IT industry

Today, I am in a thought-provoking mood. So, i will leave you with a thought.

How many IT pros in India went on to pursue IT as a career because they really had a liking towards it? Or was it more because IT was the easiest choice and there was nothing else to bank on for a living?

And if you yourself are Indian IT pro, do you actually want to continue with your career in IT? Or would you rather quit IT if given an option?

I will leave it here then. Just think. And also think, why i asked you to think on these lines-- and you will have the answers?

Why restructuring causes attrition

Restructuring exercise in any organization is interpreted by people (employees) in this way: If I am going to get a new boss and a new department, I will have to prove myself again to the new group of people. I would be better off joining a new firm at a much higher pay scale. This is a typical case of comfort zone disturbance.
Similarly, a person (an employee) might feel loss of respect in the organization or might get a feeling of jealousy due to the promotion of others or better pay-revisions of others. Again, this is a comfort zone disturbance.

And whenever there is a comfort zone disturbance, people seek greater value (self perceived value) for themselves at other places (firms) either through a perceptibly better role or salary. Note that here we are talking about self-perceptions -- but isn't that the most important factor in employee retention.

Outsourcing is no more the same

With the US economy receding, there is an increased focus within firms to on cutting all kinds of spending. And outsourcing is no more the same as it used to be few months back.

The shares of Indian IT companies have plummeted as a result of this economic slowdown (partly due to appreciating rupee too). However, while IT spending is going to be cut to some extent by some companies, there will be others who would be looking to outsource more in an effort to cut costs. So, this will kind of balance out or maybe tilted a bit towards outsourcing. But note that here we have not considered those firms who have not been outsourcing. These are the 'rich' companies who have been against outsourcing. But now they will discover that outsourcing can be their savior in difficult times. Hence, they will be forced to outsource work to countries like India.

What does this mean for Indian IT companies?
1) Risk is spread better because number of clients will increase thereby reducing the dependence on a few clients.
2) Overall demand for outsourcing will increase, thereby propelling the growth of these companies further

Attrition can’t be attributed to aspirations, salaries or job location

Whenever we talk of attrition, we talk about one of the following:
1) Job/ Role aspirations not getting met
2) Salaries being too low or revisions being improper
3) Preferences of people for particular job location (generally near to their permanent residence or family/ friends)
4) Uncooperative boss

However, these are just the triggers (the cause) to a disturbance (the affect) which leads to attrition. The disturbance we are talking about here is the 'Comfort zone disturbance'. And this is really the cause of attrition. So, what do we do to bring down attrition?

It's quite simple. Change the affect that these triggers cause. If you can somehow prevent comfort zone disturbances, you can control attrition. This means, you need to identify the elements that comprise the comfort zone of your employees; and then you need to balance out those elements whenever a comfort zone disturbance is created. It does involve quite a bit of thinking, but I believe that is the only way of controlling attrition.

Name to face and face to name

Outsourcing has been the key driver of IT industry in India and several such IT service providing countries. This has led to use of global delivery models wherein the business teams don't know the development teams. This means people are simply names (and seldom do we put faces to names). Similarly, sometimes the teams working for a particular client might not know each other well enough i.e. no names to places.

I think that overall comfort level of all the parties involved would somewhat increase if we were to put names to faces and faces to names. So, ensure:

1) Sharing of photos/ videos between onsite and offshore folks

2) Parties to be organized at account level so that people get to mingle (this finally helps in team bonding and knowledge sharing)

Now outsourcing can't cause unemployment in US

Yes. Now there is enough space for everyone in the IT industry. We often talk about outsourcing being the cause of unemployment in the US and other developed countries. This was probably true till last year or maybe even this year; however, this has changed very fast now. Here is what has caused this:

1. Growth rate of IT industry in India
With the growth rate of Indian IT industry not relenting, and the rate of creation of talent not matching it, it is obvious that there is going to be dearth of talent in Indian IT industry. Moreover, the India has not yet become a consumer of IT services in a big way. So, the growth rate is expected to be robust (same if not better) over the years to come. So, this gap between talent demand and supply is going to widen further and there will be no other choice for Indian IT companies except for hiring from US and other countries. Recently, TCS opened a 1000 people center in Ohio, US.


2. Overall economic growth of India
India is fast moving from its status of a 'developing country' to a 'developed country'. So, there is demand for talent and skill (at all levels) in all industry segments in India. Since the demand is coming from all sectors, and the pay scales rising fast in non-IT segments too, there is further dearth of talent in India.

Do you think Indian IT industry will be able to contribute to unemployment in US anymore?

No one wants SEI CMMI, not my guys at least

A typical IT services company sells SEI CMM or SEI CMMI big time. And the selling is so huge that they have almost forgotten the value that SEI CMMI brings to an organization. See http://itcit.blogspot.com/2008/06/sei-cmmi-is-crap.html

The big problem at hand is -- people (on ground) don't want to follow the processes laid by the IT firms as per SEI CMMI. The quality department is almost always running behind the delivery guys to get them to follow the processes. I know that this is the trend across most big IT services companies. But why do people not follow SEI CMMI processes in the right earnest (they do follow/fake them under the pressure from SQAs)?

I did a study, quite long back, and the major observation that came out from it was:

1. People don't understand the objective behind these processes -- and no one takes the pain to make them understand the objectives -- instead the focus is on getting them to comply either through carrot or through stick

2. Even if people are told the objective behind the processes, the objectives are explained in way that focuses towards the benefits to the IT firm and not towards the individual -- I believe the benefit of processes is more for the individual. How? Check --http://itcit.blogspot.com/2008/06/no-it-firm-benefits-from-sei-cmmi.html

Hence, people are not motivated enough to follow these processes. And wherever there is a lack of motivation, the failure is imminent.

No IT firm benefits from SEI CMMI

Answer these questions:

1) Why does one create a grocery shopping list?

2) Why does one check and cross verify ones banking transactions?

3) Why does one buy insurance?

Here are the answers:

1) Because human memory has limitations and very few people have such a sharp memory so as to remember more than 5 items

2) Because we want to be sure that nothing is amiss

3) To cover our risks

So, we are doing all these things for our own benefit. Similar is the case with SEI CMMI processes:

1) Your checklists (coding/design/ delivery etc) help you ensure that you have not missed out on anything -- if you miss out on any of these, you might have to slog later to correct them or bear the consequences

2) Similarly, requirements traceability matrix helps you tally and cross check that none of the requirements have been missed out in design, coding or testing

3) Defect prevention strategies (as advocated by SEI CMMI 5) are like risk covers -- and if there are lesser defects later, your life will be cool.

So, it's not the IT firm you are working-for that will benefit from SEI CMM or SEI CMMI, it will be you (the person who uses/implements these processes on ground) who will benefit the most

SEI CMMI is crap

Most IT firms have grossly misunderstood SEI CMMI. Today, IT firms treat SEI CMMI purely as a marketing stunt. In fact, the situation has become so bad that most IT professionals now despise SEI CMMI and consider it as crap. For most people, the mere mention of SEI CMMI is repelling.

But is it really crap and is it really just a marketing stunt?

Most people reading this blog would be aware of 'Design patterns’ and how they came into being -- Read http://itcit.blogspot.com/2008/06/invisible-design-patterns.html. Design patterns are just a compilation of best practices and tried-and-tested solution to problems that are repeatable across IT projects.

On the same lines, SEI CMMI, as I understand it, is simply a collection of best practices and guidelines for software engineering and management. In fact, I sometimes refer to it as the magic key for dumb project managers; a key that ensures the success of their project if they follow the SEI CMMI principles in the right earnest. It has really made the job of project managers really easy. It helps cover most project risks and proactive mitigates them. Things like - Requirement traceability, configuration management, acceptance criteria, defect prevention meetings are surely a prescription of ensuring success. In fact, these are the things that any project managers should be ensuring in any case (whether CMMI or not) --- SEI CMMI just reminds the PMs that they should take care of these things.

So, why is it so difficult for IT firms to ensure SEI CMMI compliance in their firms? Well, i will include this in my next post.

Don't ask your IT guys to use innovations

One of my favorite books 'Jonathan Livingston Seagull' by R. Bach, talks about boundaries being in the minds of people. These boundaries create the impression of unachievable or impossible. And Bach is able to convey the message very clearly and in the most succinct way. The question is "Who creates these boundaries?” We collectively do it as a society. First we create these boundaries and later, once these boundaries have become rigid, we talk about removing them and innovating. We tell people that 'today business can thrive only on innovation' etc. We create new models for executing our jobs. We provide them some tools for doing their jobs more efficiently.

Still doesn't work. Does it?So, what do we do then? Well, instead of giving fodder to the horse, tell it the path to find fodder.

Enable your guys (again, I am referring to employees of an IT services firm) to be innovators and not just users of innovations. That is what you need -- A big team of innovators.

And how do we prepare this team?

This can only be achieved if you orient the thought process of your guys in the right way. Just lead them to the point from where they have multiple options to proceed ahead -- instead of leading them straight to the solution. Then tell them how the final solution was reached. Ask them what could be the other possibilities and in what scenarios would such possibilities form a better choice. So, instead of telling them how the internally-developed (by some geek at your firm) productivity enhancement framework/tool works to generate code (or whatever) for a particular tier, tell them how it could have been done differently to achieve a different end. This is actually what we call as stimulus for 'Lateral thinking'. And this is what today's IT services firms need.