Not so long ago when people referred to enterprise applications they meant applications such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Product Lifecycle Management (PLM). But today the term enterprise applications needs to encompass mobile apps. These are the apps that are developed for capturing specific transactions or transaction types.
With the evolution and demand for mobile technologies, it is difficult to find an organisation that is not developing some sort of mobile app, or considering the development of one. Some organisations have gone so far as to develop their own app store so employees can download approved apps to help deliver efficiency and effectiveness. These apps tend to be targeted to specialised or specific functions. Time-recording, equipment maintenance and billing are among the most common that we see being developed for mobile technologies.
Gartner predicts that the market demand for mobile app development will grow at least five times faster than the internal IT organisations capacity to deliver them.
We are seeing mobile apps used to overcome some of the shortcomings of more traditional enterprise applications such as cost and time to implement, and poor functionality.
Here are a few things to consider before you develop your mobile app.
- How to secure data that is captured, stored and integrated using your mobile app.
- How the mobile app will fit in with your infrastructure, application and information architectures.
- Platform dependence.
- Workflow and integration.
- The transaction types suited to mobile apps.
Do you have a mobile app strategy?
Daily Stand-up Meetings
A short duration daily stand-up meeting is a great way to encourage positive team behaviours and performance. It keeps everyone on the same page. At these meetings you can discuss task status, issues, constraints and lessons learned. It can be a great way of sharing knowledge and identifying where additional effort or resources are required. It is a worthwhile investment.
