What is Citizen Development? | Concepts, Skills, and Benefits
Original source: https://cli.im/article/detail/2068
Note: The English term for Citizen Development was introduced by the consulting firm Gartner in 2010. It refers to non-professional developers using low-code or no-code platforms to create applications without the support of the IT department, aiming to enhance productivity and reduce development costs. While "Citizen Development" is commonly translated as "公民开发" in China, CaoLiao QR Code believes that Citizen Development is not merely a technology but a work model and standard. It should be translated as "全民开发," meaning that anyone who understands business processes can become a developer.
The following is a translated article based on insights from Kissflow, an online workflow automation tool, compiled by CaoLiao QR Code.
Constantly changing external environments often compel businesses to continuously review and adjust their commercial strategies. With the acceleration of digital transformation, internal IT teams face immense pressure, having to cope with ever-increasing demands. In this context, Citizen Development can be seen as an effective path to address IT backlogs.
Currently, an increasing number of enterprises worldwide are adopting Citizen Development. This approach does not require the involvement of professional IT teams. Instead, employees familiar with business processes can independently build the applications they need, thereby completing tasks more efficiently and reducing operational costs for the enterprise.
The Citizen Development model accelerates application development speed, reduces cost investments, and presents a new paradigm for enhancing enterprise productivity: applications that originally required months or even years to develop can now be completed by a non-IT worker in just a few days with the help of low-code or no-code platforms.
What is Citizen Development?
Citizen Development is defined as a business process where untrained non-IT personnel utilize no-code platforms to build applications, thereby becoming developers within the enterprise.
Unlike shadow IT, the developers here are no longer IT professionals. They could be individuals from various roles such as operations, finance, HR, or customer service. They identify digital solutions to problems they encounter and then build corresponding applications on low-code or no-code platforms, alleviating the burden on the IT department.
What Does a Citizen Developer Do?
With the support of the IT department, citizen developers use low-code or no-code tools to build business applications for themselves and other employees. They possess a deep understanding of organizational or departmental processes and also have digital capabilities. This combination of skills enables them to build applications with the help of relevant tutorials.
Unlike developers who rely on professional coding, programmers depend on code, whereas citizen developers use graphical interfaces to develop applications without writing code. This no-code development approach allows more people to participate in development work, thereby improving the overall operational efficiency of the enterprise.
Why Do Enterprises Need Citizen Development?
In most enterprises, the burden on the IT department is growing to the point where they cannot promptly respond to new requests. They are overwhelmed by a continuous stream of demands and need citizen development to share the load.
According to reports from institutions like Gartner, Dimensional Research, and Forrester, citizen developers have become an indispensable force within enterprises, used to enhance daily productivity or improve business processes, all while requiring only a fraction of the cost and time.
● 71% of business leaders believe that IT teams have numerous new solution requests, but they have not yet started processing them.
● Research shows that integrating low-code/no-code tools can increase development efficiency by 50% - 90%.
● 41% of respondents approve of citizen development practices, and 20% plan to initiate such projects.
● By 2023, the number of citizen developers is expected to be four times that of professional developers.
What Skills Do Citizen Developers Need?
To become a citizen developer within an enterprise, four fundamental skills are required:
Comprehensive understanding of business processes.
To build efficient business applications, citizen developers need a deep understanding of the bottlenecks in existing business processes. This will help them accurately analyze problems and create applications that meet the objectives.
Enhanced digital skills.
From identifying problems and proposing solutions to resolving them, proficiency in using digital tools available in the market is essential. This includes process analysis, document generation, no-code deployment, and more.
Cross-departmental collaboration skills.
The essence of citizen development is that everyone can participate. Citizen developers need to act as "liaisons," ensuring seamless collaboration between different business departments to achieve the goal of reducing costs and improving efficiency.
Strong self-motivation for improvement.
The rise of the citizen development concept paves the way for digital transformation, where everyone is a participant. In this context, citizen developers need to proactively learn and master no-code skills.
What Are the Benefits of Citizen Development?
Innovation and Efficiency
The number of applications is growing daily. To keep up with the fast-paced external environment, enterprises must adapt to markets and demands more swiftly. Citizen development offers unparalleled advantages in efficiency.
Speed
Citizen development reduces the development time for new applications. Citizen developers, who understand users, business, and requirements, can better solve problems, continuously adjust products, and provide an improved customer experience.
Reduced Shadow IT Risks
When non-IT personnel are equipped with self-development tools, they can create applications within the boundaries permitted by IT. This transforms traditional business development processes and enhances productivity across the organization.
Cost-Effectiveness
Citizen development is destined to be the future of application development. The accelerated speed of application creation, the ability to develop without code, and the deep involvement of non-IT personnel make it more cost-effective than outsourcing.
Closing Note
Like KissFlow, CaoLiao QR Code is a platform that embraces the wave of citizen development.
We modularize our features and services, allowing users to flexibly combine them as needed to independently build QR code applications such as one-item-one-code, one-event-one-code, and one-person-one-code. Simultaneously, we distill users' real-world experiences into knowledge bases like application solutions, template libraries, and industry cases. Even new users can quickly generate QR code applications by applying templates, making the barrier to entry significantly lower than that of other no-code platforms on the market.
We believe that everyone is a potential developer and should benefit from technological innovation, using simple and practical tools to solve their own problems.
Original article link: What is Citizen Development? | Overview, Skills, Benefits