Nobody Cares About Your Product

(image credit: pixabay) This week was about travel and keynote presentations. Although the traveling can be a bit of a drag, I love meeting people and hear them sell their stories after they have listened to my talk. The interesting thing is to hear that many people talk about the product that they are contributing … Read more

The End Of Architecting Systems

This week, I spent time at companies building fabulously complex systems operating in even more complex ecosystems. It is clear that the business leaders as well as the technologists in these companies are struggling with managing the complexity of the systems that they are selling to customers. Whether it is telecommunications, automotive, healthcare or any … Read more

Don’t Be Left Behind By Your Business Ecosystem

This week, the Software Center organized the Sprint 14 reporting workshop for the partner companies and universities. A great event with over 100 people participating and learning about the progress that we’ve made during the last 6 month sprint. As we have expanded the mission of  Software Center to accelerate the digitalization of the software … Read more

To All You Unsung Heroes

The coming week, Gothenburg hosts the Internal Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE 2018) where close to 2000 people come together. That same week also the Lindholmen Software Development Day is organized that brings together around 700 people interested in software, data, digitalization, artificial intelligence and related topics. At these events, there is of course a … Read more

Too Many Chiefs; Not Enough Indians

One of the most interesting patterns that I have observed again and again is that any organization tends to create layer upon layer of bureaucracy over time. Although I can’t find the reference, I remember reading somewhere that any organization increases bureaucracy with 0.7% per year. In my experience, this is a gross underestimation. Often … Read more

Why Trust Is The Foundation Of Success

Many understand the importance of trust in a society. The ability to park your car somewhere and know it will be there, undamaged when you get back. Booking and paying for a travel ticket or hotel room before arriving and knowing that it will be there. Working for an employer and knowing that there will … Read more

Activity Is Not The Same As Progress

After another week on the road, I am typing these words late Friday evening on a plane home. I spent time with three different companies (who shall remain unnamed) this week and on the way back I was reflecting on the commonalities of what I learned this week. The main lesson was: lots of activity; … Read more