This is the slide deck of a keynote I gave at Java Forum Nord 2016. I started with some of the contradictory requirements, developers find themselves often confronted with and the question, if there is a bigger context that we can use to make sense of it. Then I did a bit of "time-traveling", explaining where we came from and how business and IT have evolved over time. The core finding was that we find ourselves in the middle of a revolution that is going on (not only) in IT. The last part were some recommendations how an IT developer can at least reduce the risk to become "revolution roadkill". As always most of the content was on the voice track. But maybe the slides are still a bit helpful on their own.

1. Life, IT and everything
about revolutions, outside-the-box journeys and the daily IT madness
Uwe Friedrichsen – codecentric AG – 2014-2016

2. @ufried
Uwe Friedrichsen | uwe.friedrichsen@codecentric.de | http://slideshare.net/ufried | http://ufried.tumblr.com

3. Be flexible
… but stick to the plan!

4. Be innovative
… but don’t break anything!

5. Be agile
… but adhere to all processes!

6. Be disruptive
… but don’t change anything!

7. Be the new Netflix
… but don’t spend any money!

8. Woot ?!?

9. Have they all gone nuts?

10. Or is there a bigger schema,
we just don’t recognize?
Meaning
Madness

11. Time for a short journey
through space and time ...

12. Journey #1
The evolution of markets

13. Formal part of
value creation
Solution:
machine
Dynamic part
of value
creation
Solution: man
sluggishness/low dynamic high dynamichigh dynamic
The historical course of market dynamics
and the recent rise of highly dynamic and complex markets
The dominance of high dynamics and complexity is neither good nor bad. It‘s a historical fact.
t1970/80 today
Age of
crafts manu-
facturing
Age of
tayloristic
industry
Age of
global
markets
1850/1900
Spacious markets,
little competition
Local markets,
high customi-
zation
Outperformers exercise
market pressure over
conventional companies
We call the graph shown here the “Taylor Bathtub”.
The “bathtub” curve
Source: BetaCodex Network Associates, “Organize for complexity”, BetaCodex Network White Paper 12 & 13

14. Formal part of
value creation
Solution:
machine
Dynamic part
of value
creation
Solution: man
sluggishness/low dynamic high dynamichigh dynamic
The historical course of market dynamics
and the recent rise of highly dynamic and complex markets
The dominance of high dynamics and complexity is neither good nor bad. It‘s a historical fact.
t1970/80 today
Age of
crafts manu-
facturing
Age of
tayloristic
industry
Age of
global
markets
1850/1900
Spacious markets,
little competition
Local markets,
high customi-
zation
Outperformers exercise
market pressure over
conventional companies
We call the graph shown here the “Taylor Bathtub”.
Pre-industrial era
Source: BetaCodex Network Associates, “Organize for complexity”, BetaCodex Network White Paper 12 & 13
Tailor-made
solutions
“Mastery
is key to success”

15. Formal part of
value creation
Solution:
machine
Dynamic part
of value
creation
Solution: man
sluggishness/low dynamic high dynamichigh dynamic
The historical course of market dynamics
and the recent rise of highly dynamic and complex markets
The dominance of high dynamics and complexity is neither good nor bad. It‘s a historical fact.
t1970/80 today
Age of
crafts manu-
facturing
Age of
tayloristic
industry
Age of
global
markets
1850/1900
Spacious markets,
little competition
Local markets,
high customi-
zation
Outperformers exercise
market pressure over
conventional companies
We call the graph shown here the “Taylor Bathtub”.
Industrial era
Source: BetaCodex Network Associates, “Organize for complexity”, BetaCodex Network White Paper 12 & 13
Cost-efficiently
scale production
“Get more done with less people
is key to success”

16. Formal part of
value creation
Solution:
machine
Dynamic part
of value
creation
Solution: man
sluggishness/low dynamic high dynamichigh dynamic
The historical course of market dynamics
and the recent rise of highly dynamic and complex markets
The dominance of high dynamics and complexity is neither good nor bad. It‘s a historical fact.
t1970/80 today
Age of
crafts manu-
facturing
Age of
tayloristic
industry
Age of
global
markets
1850/1900
Spacious markets,
little competition
Local markets,
high customi-
zation
Outperformers exercise
market pressure over
conventional companies
We call the graph shown here the “Taylor Bathtub”.
Post-industrial era
Source: BetaCodex Network Associates, “Organize for complexity”, BetaCodex Network White Paper 12 & 13
Continuously respond
to changing demands
“Continuous
customer communication
is key to success”

17. Industrial era
• Cost-efficiency
• Scalability
• Repeatability
• Stability
Changing markets create new drivers
Post-industrial era
• Cycle times
• Adaptability
• Flexibility
• Resilience

18. Side note
Organizations as enablers and preventers

19. Journey #2
The evolution of IT

20. 1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
Complicated
(Business functions)
Complex
(Business processes)
Highly complex
(Business nervous system)
Software crisis
Software engineering
PC
LAN
Internet
Business
Support
of IT
Selective
Holistic
Complicated
Complex
“Moore’s law”
Mobile
IoT

21. 1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
Complicated
(Business functions)
Complex
(business processes)
Highly complex
(Business nervous system)
Software crisis
Software engineering
PC
LAN
Internet
Business
Support
of IT
Selective
Holistic
Complicated
Complex
“Moore’s law”
Mobile
IoT
We are
here …

22. 1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
Complicated
(Business functions)
Complex
(business processes)
Highly complex
(Business nervous system)
Software crisis
Software engineering
PC
LAN
Internet
Business
Support
of IT
Selective
Holistic
Complicated
Complex
“Moore’s law”
Mobile
IoT
… but we still base most of
our decisions on that
We are
here …

23. Formal part of
value creation
Solution:
machine
Dynamic part
of value
creation
Solution: man
sluggishness/low dynamic high dynamichigh dynamic
The historical course of market dynamics
and the recent rise of highly dynamic and complex markets
The dominance of high dynamics and complexity is neither good nor bad. It‘s a historical fact.
t1970/80 today
Age of
crafts manu-
facturing
Age of
tayloristic
industry
Age of
global
markets
1850/1900
Spacious markets,
little competition
Local markets,
high customi-
zation
Outperformers exercise
market pressure over
conventional companies
We call the graph shown here the “Taylor Bathtub”.
Remember the bathtub curve?
This adds an additional twist …

24. 1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
Complicated
(Business functions)
Complex
(business processes)
Highly complex
(Business nervous system)
Software crisis
Software engineering
PC
LAN
Internet
Business
Support
of IT
Selective
Holistic
Complicated
Complex
“Moore’s law”
Mobile
IoT
… but we still base most of
our decisions on that
We are
here …
Business is very different today …
… than it was back then

25. Business
Market
IT today is a …
… Nervous System
… Medium
… Product
… Differentiator
Disruptive
Technologies
Business
Support
Systems
Continuous
Conversation
Digitization

26. Business is IT and IT is business

27. The traditional IT “best practices” are
counterproductive because they solve
a completely different problem

28. What can we learn?

29. We are in the middle of a revolution

30. Unfortunately, quite often
we do not feel like them …

31. ... but more like them

32. How can we avoid becoming
revolution roadkill?

33. A few recommendations …

34. #1
Understand the post-industrial IT

35. Rethinking IT

36. What are the new drivers?

37. IT
Post-Industrialism
Highly dynamic markets
Economic Darwinism
Lean startup/lean enterprise
Continuous design
Digitization
IT as a product
Digital conversation
Social media
Contextual computing
Disruption
Innovation through disruption
Cloud, mobile, IoT, serverless
Big data analytics
Data-driven enterprise
force
change
on

38. What are the new goals?

39. IT
… be quick
Short response times
Holistic IT value chain consideration
… be effective
Focus on outcome, not output
… improve continuously
Improvement as planned activity
needs
to …
… be efficient
Provide required throughput
… be reliable
High availability and reliability
… be flexible
Flexible response to changing needs

40. Process & Org
needs to be …
Quick
Flexible
Effective
Software
needs to be …
Secure
Changeable
Robust
… and improve continuously

41. Process & Org
needs to be …
Software
needs to be …
Quick
Flexible
Effective
Secure
Changeable
Robust
… and improve continuously
How can we achieve the new goals?

42. Let’s learn from the digitization natives

43. Adaption
DevOps
Systemic optimization
Inspect and adapt
Quick feedback loops
Continuous improvement
…
Process
DevOps
Agile
Lean
Feature Flow (no projects)
Design Thinking
…
Governance
Beyond Budgeting
Decentralized control
Outcome-driven
Lean EAM
…
Organization
DevOps
Autonomous teams
Cross-functional teams
End-2-end responsibility
Routine task automation
…
People
Craftsmanship
T-shaped
Responsibility
Curiosity
Empathy
…
Technology
Cloud
Automation
Microservice
Heterogeneity
Resilience
…
(Some) Building Blocks

44. These building blocks don’t sum up,
they multiply up

45. Cross-functional teams
(organized by business capabilities)
Autonomy
(incl. E2E responsibility)
Decentralized control
Microservices
Continuous Delivery
Heterogeneity
Cloud and Containers
Resilience
Operations automation
Craftsmanship & mastery
Outcome-driven
Beyond budgeting
Feature flow
Lean EAM
Continuous improvement
T-Shaped people
(being empathic)
DevOps
Quick feedback loops
Curiosity

46. #2
Know your place in the revolution

47. Take the real magic triangle …

48. You may pick
two
Good
Fast
Cheap
Optimizing for quality and cycle times
will result in higher costs
Optimizing for quality and costs
will result in long cycle times
Optimizing for cycle times and costs
will result in reduced quality

49. ... and ask for the two properties to pick

50. You may pick
two
Good
Fast
Cheap
Industrial IT
Deliver large batches at minimized costs
towards slow markets
Post-industrial IT
Quickly adapt to ever-changing needs
of dynamic, fast-moving markets
Startup IT
Test hypotheses and pivot as fast as possible
to discover a product-market fit

51. #3
Pick the appropriate weapons

52. #4
Discuss change based on pain, not tools

53. #5
Be prepared

54. Be prepared
• Learn the tools and technologies
of the post-industrial IT
• Keep your current skills and tools sharp
• Understand which knowledge will become
less valuable (or even contra-productive)
• Be curious and understand the concepts
outside your domain (become T-shaped)
• Improve your empathic skills!

55. add. #1
Visit the Java Forum Nord … ;)

56. add. #2
Stick to the hitchhiker‘s guide …