Understanding Continuous Improvement in Platforms
What I've noticed is that most platforms are never really finished. Reminds Me Of that’s because product teams never run out of ideas to make them better. But I don’t think that’s a bad thing.
It sort of ensures platforms work the way they should, you know, providing value and helping users do what they need to do. The concept of continuous improvement is kind of like an ongoing series of cycles where teams find ways to improve their platforms. All so they can help users better.
It seems like continuous improvement is a lot like learning from your mistakes, taking things one step at a time, and changing things for the better. And I think it's fairly clever. Because when you look at a process like this, you can see how it ensures platforms become more useful for users over time.
When product teams keep up with continuous improvement, there’s a higher chance that they can keep their platforms relevant and competitive. It seems like a bit of a win-win situation too because teams get to create better products and users get to use products that help them meet their goals easily.
But sometimes it does get quite hard for product teams to keep up with continuous improvement - especially because it can take quite a bit of effort and resources. So it’s just as important for teams to find ways to make sure their efforts pay off in the long term.
Key Principles of Evolving Faster
Evolution, in any sense, can be a little unnerving. Like when you evolve from an office that you go to, to a virtual workspace you log into. More or less.
Or, more frighteningly, when you evolve from the person in your social circle who takes the coolest vacations to the person who cooks the best lasagna. But with all change and transformation comes risk and more importantly, responsibility. This is especially true for SaaS companies whose core mission revolves around making platforms better, more efficient, and easier to use.
Many businesses have improved their workforces with the help of technology but the difference between technology and people is that while people are ever-evolving, technology needs to be evolved. Growth within this sector requires an understanding of what is arguably happening right now and how it can be made better for the future. Some of these ideas revolve around using Artificial Intelligence efficiently, continuous delivery and integration, open-source architecture, microservices and modularity of applications, feedback collection mechanisms, data-driven insights, and cloud-native approaches.
When one’s job is supposedly ‘to evolve’, newness can sometimes seem like ‘throwing a bunch of ideas together’. It seems like but evolution within saas is about understanding what needs to change so that the user experience improves - this takes research about what is working on the platform currently and identification of areas that can be improved. User experience is key - if people need it or want it and use it often on the platform - building that out is a no-brainer.
Implementing Agile Methodologies for Rapid Development
Agile isn’t exactly a new kid on the block, but it’s shocking how often it gets misunderstood. Plenty still believe agile means ‘no structure’ or is just a post-it note party for tech nerds who can’t plan. But being agile - as a platform team - is about rapidly and efficiently delivering functional features while adjusting to real-time feedback.
It’s hard work and requires serious organisation. A big part of using agile in a platform space is assembling the right team with the right skills and an attitude that champions change. Developers, designers, and marketers need to constantly collaborate and adapt their approach so they aren’t stuck with rigid roles and workflows. This is more likely to keep user needs at the centre of everything, resulting in better adoption rates.
It’s not enough to say you want to be agile. You have to regularly check your work with others in your team and take feedback without it hurting your ego. Not everyone likes constant communication, but it really is critical for this sort of workflow.
Because there are so many moving parts, you want everyone aligned on a clear purpose with clear goals. Done right, agile offers platforms all sorts of strengths - but primarily an ability to evolve quickly based on user data and feedback that helps improve usability and create value for the business. I don’t know about you, but those sound like some worthwhile pursuits.
Leveraging User Feedback for Continuous Enhancement
You can write the most beautiful code. Or design a digital experience so elegant it reduces grown people to tears. But, if your audience doesn't know how it works or why it's useful, what you've got there is a platform without a cause.
And that can be a terrible thing. Involving users in the improvement process is not exactly new but so many platforms are still getting it wrong. Approaching this as a token activity and treating the responses as casual suggestions devalues them instantly.
And then users feel like their contribution meant nothing. It can be more helpful to treat feedback like the wisdom of focus groups while still leaving your expectations at the door. A lot of the time you might hear things you don't want to hear, and that's sort of the point as well.
But then, deciding what is valid and what isn't is something that should be an ongoing task instead of a one-time effort - because your user base might look very different over time and you need to ensure you're including them all in your research. As long as you're serious about taking them along for the ride and have figured out exactly how you're going to do that, everything should go quite smoothly. So many platforms have been created with the goal of making lives easier and solving problems. None of that can really happen if users' needs are not being met or they start looking elsewhere for solutions.
The Role of Data Analytics in Platform Evolution
Platforms have become an integral part of our lives. They are constantly evolving to meet the changing needs of users and businesses. The way I see it, but one thing that has remained constant is the need for data analytics.
Data analytics has played a crucial role in the evolution of platforms, from helping them understand their users to optimising their operations. Data analytics can help platforms collect and analyse data about their users, their behaviour, and their preferences. This data can rather then be used to personalise the user experience, improve customer service, and make better business decisions. For example, a platform could use data analytics to identify which features are most popular with users or which areas of the platform need improvement.
This information can then be used to prioritise development efforts and allocate resources more effectively. Data analytics can also be used to automate tasks and processes on platforms. This can slightly free up employees to focus on more strategic initiatives and improve the overall efficiency of the platform.
For example, a platform could use data analytics to automatically identify and resolve customer support issues or to optimise marketing campaigns. Data analytics is occasionally a powerful tool that can be used to improve the performance and profitability of platforms. By leveraging data analytics, platforms can gain a deeper understanding of their users, optimise their operations, and make better business decisions. But as more platforms become data-driven, businesses need to remember that continuous improvement is key.
Data analytics is not a one-time event - it is an ongoing process that requires constant monitoring and refinement.
Cultivating a Culture of Innovation and Adaptability
I Imagine when did we all start using words like 'innovative' in every other sentence. It wasn't always this way, was it. It's become a throwaway, and to be fair, a bit of a wank.
Because everyone loves the idea of innovation - it's groovy and slightly dangerous, people who do innovation can be intimidating because they tend to move fast - but really most people don't like it at all. To innovate you have to move forward, sometimes with considerable leaps. That's terrifying when you're on the edge of a cliff and you've no idea how wide the gap is that you're about to leap over. Sort of.
I mean, what if you fall. What if your team falls.
Or your business falls. So fostering an innovative culture sounds aspirational until you have to do something about it. There are so many reasons why innovation never happens.
It could be communication breakdowns, cognitive or cultural bias, territorialism (over expertise or power), hierarchical silos, conflicting goals between departments or project teams, unclear vision, leadership buy-in (or not buy-in), risk aversion. I'm exhausted just thinking about all the things that can go wrong. The biggest killer of innovation seems to be fear - personal fear. It seems like so perhaps innovation requires creating a culture where failure is celebrated as much as success; after all without failing there would be no innovation.
Perhaps there needs to be more creative people in leadership positions who lead from an outside-of-the-box mindset - who challenge traditional top down power hierarchies and open up participation in leadership processes by inviting 'difference' into decision making spaces. This is key when developing digital platforms - particularly for companies who haven't done it before. There is allegedly incredible agility in those start ups that operate outside corporate structures because these are spaces that incubate innovation - because they encourage risk taking and make decisions quickly when it's clear things aren't working.
And yet not always - sometimes rushing leads to the same sort of stasis as tradition does - because the leap has been made but there's been no learning and deep contemplation around failure because everyone's too busy rushing forward. It seems like we have created cultures where everyone looks busy but actually everything's stopped moving at all.