The effect of enterprise agility on systems engineering

Agility and agile transformation are topics that have long since gained importance beyond software development and IT. Isaac Sacolick, one of the thought leaders in this field, recently commented on this. In the following, I examine what this means for systems engineering.

Isaac Sacolick has the excellent book Driving Digital in which he describes very specifically how a digital transformation can be implemented by a CIO.

Under the term Driving Digital 2025 he is currently working on his next book. This was motivated by the observation that there are major problems with digitalization in practice. For example, 54% of all CIOs in a KPMI survey said that the alignment between IT and business management is tending to deteriorate. 78% of CIOs reported a moderate impact at best from their transformation initiatives. How is this possible, given that digital transformation is now mainstream and investments are being made accordingly? One important reason is:

Transformation is difficult, and it is not easy to find the right people.

But there are also concrete reasons and opportunities to improve the situation, for example:

• Are we dealing with transition or transformation? The first is, for example, the change from one technology to another, the second is a fundamental change.
• What really matters? There is a lot that attracts our attention. We must not get bogged down.
• Dealing with technical debt: Are we continuously expanding our IT portfolio or are we also maintaining it? Are systems that are not needed being shut down?
• Do we involve the people?
• Do we have the relevant data to justify our activities?

Systems Engineering

In systems engineering, too, there is increasing pressure to deliver concrete results that are important for business success, as well as to deal with increasing complexity and customer expectations. Much of what Isaac recommends also has a direct impact on systems engineering. Specifically:

• We must expect existing technologies to become obsolete and therefore need to be replaced. This means that Modularization (at development level) is more important than ever to limit the impact of changes.
• During development, the focus must be on the benefits for the stakeholders. This is why it is so important to Traceability to the customer's requirements. Isaac says that we have to make sure that architects think about the customer.
• We must continuously modernize our systems and systematically pay off "technical debts".
• We must People provide them with a framework in which they can independently contribute to the success of the business.
• We must not guess, but must make decisions with corresponding metrics prove it.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: nothing works without the right people. It is therefore important to involve people accordingly, to give them freedom and a common direction. This also means, for example, that everyone understands which aspects of the system just have to be "good enough" and which really give a competitive advantage.

Conclusion

Especially at management level, there are many similarities between SE and IT in terms of what counts for a successful digital transformation. In particular, there needs to be a common understanding of what really counts at the end of the day. IT and SE will decide for themselves what needs to be done to achieve this.

Image source: Transformation 2025