Jan Bosch
Jan Bosch For many years, organizations have talked about cross-functional teams as a desirable end state. The idea is appealing: Bring together people with different skills, remove handovers and let teams move faster. In practice, companies struggle with creating effective cross-functional teams. The teams may be created and have the right form but fail to embrace the … Read more
Over the past decades, software-intensive systems companies have gone through several major paradigm shifts. We moved from hardware-centric products to software-defined systems, from waterfall to Agile, from projects to products and now superset platforms, and from episodic releases to continuous deployment. When each of these shifts became relevant, it was initially resisted and, intentionally or … Read more
One of the most persistent misconceptions I encounter when discussing data and AI is the idea that they’re primarily about better predictions, smarter dashboards or more advanced analytics. While all of these have value, they miss the deeper point. The real strategic power of data and AI lies in their ability to enable continuous learning … Read more
One useful way to understand how companies develop and evolve their offerings is to look at what they fundamentally organize around. In my experience, most organizations fall into one of three broad categories: project-centric, product-centric or platform-centric. Project-centric companies organize everything as a project. Whether they’re developing a product, adapting it for a specific customer … Read more
The history of industry is littered with failed projects. Projects where a team was asked to build a product based on a specification, a budget and a timeline. And failed. According to the research I’ve conducted, 60-80 percent of all IT projects are considered failures in some sense, either because they failed completely or failed … Read more
Although there’s quite a bit of criticism of the new, young generations of millennials and Gen Zers, one aspect that I genuinely appreciate is their focus on purpose and meaning. As a Gen Xer, I grew up professionally in a time dominated by capitalism, globalization, efficiency and scale. Success was measured primarily in growth curves, … Read more
As we approach the end of 2025, it’s clear that the context in which software-intensive companies operate is shifting faster than ever. Over the year, working closely with businesses in domains such as automotive, telecom, industrial equipment and security, I’ve seen a growing divergence. Some organizations are accelerating, embracing data and AI to transform their … Read more
As I write this, I’m on my way home from a conference organized by the European automotive industry. Many will realize that this industry is having a very hard time right now. Low economic growth is causing people to not buy new cars. This is exacerbated by competition from the west and the east in … Read more
Over the last months, this series has explored the transition toward becoming an AI-driven company, with a particular focus on software-intensive systems industries such as automotive, industrial automation, telecommunications, energy and manufacturing equipment. These sectors face a unique constellation of challenges: long product lifecycles, safety-critical functions, complex supply chains, heterogeneous technology stacks and deeply embedded … Read more
When I started this series on the AI-driven company, we had developed three maturity models: AI in the company’s business process, the use of AI for the R&D process and AI in the product. Since then, however, we’ve developed a fourth model, which is concerned with AI in the business ecosystem that the company operates … Read more
