What are some key contributors to failure modes in BPM and application development? BP3's Chief Operating Officer, Rainer Ribback, discusses the importance of methodology to your success.

Rainer: The person looking at you in the monitor, you are the wizard. It's like out of one of those movies where you are the wizard behind the curtain.

Speaker 2: I know, and it really bugs me.

Rainer: Your oz [inaudible 00:00:12].

Speaker 2: Thanks, Rainer, for being here. We're going to talk about, I guess, methodology this morning. What's the single largest failure mode you've seen in application development?

Rainer: One of the key contributors to failure modes that we see in the market in the industry is just an absence of respect for the underlying value propositions of the technology. For us what that means is folks really taking the time to understand the technology that they're working with, what the value propositions are, what the points of leverage are in using that particular piece of software or that particular software platform, and using that to apply to the methodology that they're then going to use to implement the software or drive business value with the software.

Speaker 2: When you respect that underlying technology, where does that all meet with creating good software methodology?

Rainer: One of the challenges when you tret the platform as a commodity or you treat the software application that you're using as a commodity, and not understanding the inner workings, the value propositions, the way it works, it really compromises your ability to do good design, taking advantage of all the value propositions of that software. We don't treat the software like it's a commodity. We get to know what that technology is, what the value propositions are and what the design considerations. We need to be thoughtful in terms of requirements designed, requirements captured, and we also need to make sure that we're bringing these things together from a craftsmanship stand point. How do you take advantage of that platform? How do you take advantage of organizing the requirements in a way that allows you to get the most out of the design?

Speaker 2: You talk about organizing requirements around design aspects of the technology. Do you have a methodology for that?

Rainer: A colleague and I have been working together for the last 15 years and in 2003, we started working together on software methodology. It pulls together agile methodology, concepts in lean six sigma, big data, cognitive, basically analytics in whatever they are called these days. We're always looking towards the state of the art. We're always looking towards best practices in industry and what some of our colleagues are doing, as well as what the system vendors are advocating in terms of how to take advantage of all the benefits of the software platforms. That allows us to follow through on our project. It allows us to adhere to good design principles. It allows us to set up and organize in a very thoughtful way so that we can deliver the project to the expectations of the customer.

Speaker 3: So you like all the content we got on there?

Speaker 2: I like that.

Speaker 3: Okay. Feels good. Great job, Rainer.

Rainer: Oh cool. That's it.

Speaker 3: It's easy.

Rainer: Awesome. Wow.

Speaker 3: Yeah.