In our second installment, we covered Salesforce’s Maturing and expanding cloud footprint in the enterprise and its implications for technical debt.
Sidebar: "Show me the incentive, and I will show you the outcome.", Charlie Munger, former Vice Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway.
An enterprise's governance model should include proactive incentives to manage tech debt digital operating models (DOM). The governance structure and digital operating model should balance the need for individual developers to go fast with the need to manage risks across all business functions, architectural frameworks, apps, and development teams. The DOM and governance model should prioritize business value, speed, and the accumulation and remediation of tech debt. In the previous installment, we discussed the role of governance overlay constructs, including the APB and ESSC.
Organizations should consider implementing a governance guideline with positive incentives that require an admin or developer to evaluate the investment to migrate incremental new automation to the Flow framework with their supervisor. This practice will help manage tech debt over time and enable new and evolved functionality with greater agility for the business.
While most organizations have migrated most of their original workflows to Visual Flows, yet the same cannot be said about existing Apex automation. Many believe it's faster and easier to augment existing code-based Apex rather than refactor automation into a well-conceived Flow framework design. However, keeping track of all this automation and how it works together can be challenging and undermine new functionality. Therefore, having the right policies, guidelines, and incentives in place is crucial to incentivize prioritized tech debt.
The famous Psychology Behaviorist B.F. Skinner said, "The way positive reinforcement is carried out is more important than the amount." Organizations should include positive incentives in their governance practices to create tech debt remediation user stories, providing dev teams with high-value tech debt remediation work at their fingertips during work lulls. Additionally, shout-outs to team members who follow the guidelines and modest financial incentives can reinforce the proper behavior.
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