Based on the book “What Would Google Do” by Jeff Jarvis, I’m writing a post series about the New Rules of IWMS. Today is the ninth post of the series entitled “New Speed” in which I’ll discuss the impact speed has on IWMS Software.
Intolerance for slow
Google has made us an impatient people, more than we know. If we can get any of the world’s knowledge in a blink, why should we wait on hold or in line or until your office opens? (Jarvis, 2009)
Google made us addicted to the speed of information. It empowered us to find relevant information in the blink of an eye.
With every search we have become more addicted to speed. What’s more, we don’t tolerate slow anymore.
The intolerance for slow has primarily impacted two domains for IWMS; the technological platform and research and development procedures.
Over the last couple of years IWMS vendors have invested enormous amounts of money in R&D to adapt their products to the new speed limits. Five years ago people tolerated client-server applications. Today every IWMS needs to be web based and ‘in the cloud’, and it better be fast. Impatience has impacted the IWMS software industry immensely.
Back in the days many vendors had release cycles that lasted more than a year. Which was fine at that time. Nobody really cared about release frequencies. As long as the IWMS software did what it intended, without too many bugs, customers were happy. Not anymore.
Most vendors have now adopted agile development methodologies enabling them to react faster on customer’s demands. Some vendors even adopted a monthly release schedule. I think that the quest for speed will continue over the next couple of years, simply as IWMS software needs to keep up with us, customers and frequent users of other software which delivers results at the speed of light.
In that respect Google and others constantly force IWMS vendors to adapt and improve.
And they do.
Resources
Jarvis, J. (2009). What Would Google Do. New York: HarperBusiness.
10NR, IWMS, Rules, Speed
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