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All Hands on Tech. The AI-Powered Citizen Revolution. Edition No. 1

  • Book

  • 304 Pages
  • October 2024
  • John Wiley and Sons Ltd
  • ID: 5972913
Supercharge your organization's capacity for innovation

The greatest untapped asset in an enterprise today is the ingenuity of its people. Dive into a future of work where technology empowers everyone to be a creator and builder with All Hands on Tech: The Citizen Revolution in Business Technology. This pivotal book offers a comprehensive look into the role of citizen developers - business domain experts who are driving IT-enabled innovation using technology previously reserved for professional technologists. Through case studies of citizens and citizen-enabled enterprises, the authors demonstrate how emerging technology bestows unprecedented power on these individuals and unprecedented value on the organizations that channel their efforts. They outline a transformative approach to citizen development that not only enhances companies' innovative capacity via the empowerment of domain experts, but also minimizes risk and liberates IT departments to pursue more strategic initiatives.

All Hands on Tech describes a revolution in work - powered by technology becoming more human and humans becoming more comfortable with technology. This convergence provides a clear pathway for enterprises to leverage the on-the-ground experience and insight of all employees. The authors provide diverse examples of companies that have aligned the work of their citizen developers with wider organizational goals across citizen data science, automation, and development projects. These examples demonstrate why and how to commit to the citizen revolution in your organization.

In the book, you'll: - Discover the untapped potential of citizen developers to revolutionize business operations with technology democratization - Find a practical framework for integrating citizen development into a broader corporate digital and data strategy, while controlling risk - Explore a forward-thinking approach to redefining the roles of all hands in an enterprise, empowering them to turn ideas into applications, automations, and analytical/AI models

For business leaders, executives, managers, and IT professionals looking to harness the full potential of their front-line employees and redefine the landscape of IT work, All Hands on Tech is a must-have resource. For business domain specialists and those eager to turn ideas into action, the citizen revolution democratizes information technology and empowers you to lead your organization towards a more innovative and efficient future. For subject matter experts, domain specialists, and those eager to put their ideas to work while also future-proofing their careers with invaluable skills, the citizen revolution ushers in an entirely new way of working.

Table of Contents

Preface xv

Introduction xxvii

Part 1 Background, History, and Context 1

Chapter 1 Why Citizen Development Is Inevitable 3

What Are Citizens? 4

Why Is Citizen Development Growing? 6

The Front Lines of Digitalization 9

Monarchy, Federalism, or Anarchy? 12

Like Seemingly Everything Else, Citizen Development Is Social 14

Making Citizen Development Safe and Effective 16

Generative AI and the Future of Citizen Development 18

Chapter 2 A History of Citizen-Led Innovation 21

Outsiders and Insiders in Business Improvement 21

The Open Innovation/Crowdsourcing Movement 23

Open Source in Software 25

The Maker Movement 26

The Growth of Citizen Science - Starting with Ornithology 28

A Slow but Pronounced Shift 30

Chapter 3 The Citizen Journey 33

Diverse Journeys 33

Initial Capabilities 34

Automation Comes Next 36

The Journey to More Sophisticated Analytics 36

The Citizen’s Career in a Large Organization - for a While 37

Citizen Data Science in an Organization That Welcomes Them 40

A More Dramatic Career Transformation 41

The Citizen as Rogue Agent 43

The Citizen as Entrepreneur 44

A Citizen Data Science Startup 46

Part 2 Calling All Hands 49

Chapter 4 Citizen Development Using Low-Code/ No-Code Tools 51

How Did We Get Here? 53

It’s Not Just Citizens 53

What Can an Organization Do with Low-Code/ No-Code? 54

Citizen/Professional Collaboration and Fusion Teams 56

Generative AI as a No-Code Solution 58

How to Succeed with Low-Code/No-Code 59

Management Challenges with Low-Code/No-Code 60

Chapter 5 Citizen Automation 63

Citizen Automator 64

Types of Work Well-Suited to Automation 64

Integrating Between Systems as Human APIs 65

Performing a Series of Tasks: Workflow 67

Making Decisions Based on Defined Rules 68

The Offices Where Automation Plays 69

Back Office 69

Front Office 69

Middle Office 70

The Origin Story of Broad Automation Adoption 70

Who Is a Citizen Automator? 72

Where Does Citizen Automation Belong? 73

What Is the Upside of Citizen Automation? 74

Idea/Execution Overlap 74

Prototyping the Future State 75

Increased Speed 76

Employee Experience and Loyalty 77

Fostering Cross-Departmental Innovation 77

What Can Go Wrong? 78

Overhyped and Under-Delivered 78

Paving Cow Paths 78

Technical Debt 79

The Future of Citizen Automation 80

Chapter 6 Citizen Data Science 81

Citizen Data Analysis 82

True Citizen Data Science 85

What Is the Upside of True Citizen Data Science? 87

What Kinds of People Become Citizen Data Scientists? 88

What Can Go Wrong? 90

What Kinds of Problems Should Citizen Data Scientists Take On? 92

Citizen Data Science for Generative AI 93

Citizen Data Science and Data Flow Automation 95

How Can Citizen Data Scientists Work in Data Science Teams? 96

How Will the Citizen Data Scientist Role Evolve Over Time? 98

Chapter 7 The Skills and Personality of Citizens 101

Workers of the Future, in the Future of Work 101

Personality Traits of a Citizen Developer 103

Passion 103

Curiosity and Willingness to Learn 104

Perseverance and Grit 105

Creativity and Innovation 106

Mindset 107

Entrepreneurial Mindset 107

Computational Mindset 108

Hybrid Mindset 109

Skills of the Future 109

Skills of Citizen Developers 110

Domain-Specific Skills 111

Literacies 112

Data Literacy 112

Analytics Literacy 113

Digital Literacy 115

Technical Skills 116

Human Relationship Skills 119

Communication and Collaboration Skills 120

Political Skills 121

The Final Tally 121

Chapter 8 The Citizen Champion: With and Without Air Cover 123

Shell: High Air Cover 124

Dentsu and Tinuiti: Air Cover, but Citizen Focus When Ready 125

Arcadis: Growing Air Cover Over Time 126

Quiet Growth in Citizen Development at Amtrak 128

Lessons from Citizen Development Champions 130

The Long-Term Fate of Citizen Development Champions 132

Part 3 Getting to Work 133

Chapter 9 The Citizen Tech Landscape 135

Information Technology Is Important - Duh! 136

What Makes a Tool Citizen-Ready? 136

The Evolution of Programming Languages 137

Current Citizen Tools and Platform Landscape 138

Low-Code/No-Code Application Platforms for Citizen Development 138

Citizen Automation Technologies 139

Robotic Process Automation for Execution 141

IDP: Helping RPA See 142

Other Tools in the Automation Stack 143

Citizen Data Science Technologies 143

New Developments for Citizens in Business Intelligence 145

The Generative AI Era of Citizen Development 147

Chapter 10 Benefits of Citizen Development 151

Targeting and Scaling Improvement Benefits 152

Innovation and Experimentation Benefits 155

Chapter 11 The Organizational Response to Citizen Technology 161

The Two Stereotypical Positions 161

Beyond the IT Resistance Stereotype 163

An Emerging Third Party 165

“Governance” of Citizen Technologies 167

Citizen Technology in Highly Regulated Businesses 170

Putting It All Together: Balancing Risk and Reward 172

Part 4 Setting Sail 175

Chapter 12 Preparing to Set Sail 177

Maturity Models 178

Citizen Development Maturity Model 178

Stage 0: Random Acts of Citizenry 179

Stage 1: Awareness 179

Stage 2: Acceptance and Focused Exploration 180

Stage 3: Formal Adoption 180

Stage 4: Industrialization 181

Stage 5: Absorption 181

Cast of Characters 182

Leading Roles 182

Citizen Developers 183

Citizen Automators 183

Citizen Data Scientists 184

A Citizen by Any Other Name 184

Supporting Roles 184

Citizen Champion 184

Citizen Coach 184

Citizen Librarian 184

Stakeholders 185

The 4G Approach to Citizen-Readiness 186

Chapter 13 Genesis 187

Genesis Fork 1: Submit or Just Commit 187

Submit, Then Commit 188

Commit 189

Fork 2: Create or Orchestrate 190

Create Your Citizenry 191

Orchestrate Your Citizenry 192

Fork 3: Revolution or Evolution 193

Revolution 193

Evolution 194

Starting Strong with the Fundamentals 195

Benefits 195

Talent 197

Key Performance Indicators 197

Chapter 14 Governance 201

Fork 4: Tolerate Risk or Avoid Risk 202

Risk Tolerance 202

Risk Avoidance 203

Fork 5: Bottom Up vs. Top Down 204

Top-Down Governance 204

Bottom-Up Governance 205

Fork 6: Centralize or Federate 206

Centralized Governance 207

Federated Governance 207

Enabling a Successful Voyage 209

Risks 209

Organizational Structure 211

Governance Models 212

Chapter 15 Guidance 215

Fork 7: Solo or in Teams 215

Go Alone 215

Go Together 216

Fork 8: Direct or Explore 217

Direct Instruction 218

Project-Based Learning 219

Nurturing the Crew 220

Training 220

Levels of Citizen Certification 221

Citizen Lite 224

Community Building 224

Ideation and Creativity 224

Chapter 16 Guardrails 227

Fork 9: Stewards or Shields 228

Stewards 228

Shields 229

Facilitating Best Behaviors 230

Human Guardrails 230

Automated Guardrails 231

Financial Guardrails 231

Chapter 17 The Future of Citizen Development 235

Citizen Development: Too Pervasive to Have a Name? 236

The Future of the IT Function and IT People 237

Coaching and Assessing, Not Developing 238

Ultimate Fusion 239

Broader Tech and Data Leadership 240

The Role of AI 241

Appendix A Citizen-Ready Checklist 245

Preparing to Set Sail 245

Genesis 246

Governance 247

Guidance 248

Guardrails 250

Appendix B Citizen Development Challenges Organizations Are Likely to Face 253

Appendix C Additional Resources 255

Acknowledgments 257

About the Authors 259

Index 261

Authors

Thomas H. Davenport Babson College, MA, USA. Ian Barkin