4 Ways Citizen Development Benefits Technical Teams

Technology has changed a lot in recent years and so have the expectations regarding software applications. Not too long ago, it was simply accepted that creating business applications was the responsibility of IT professionals. But the steady rise and evolution of low-code development platforms over the last decade has flipped the conversation on its head.

Today, leading companies are embracing a new approach to build software solutions faster. It’s called citizen development.

It’s the practice of giving non-IT workers the ability to build applications with minimal coding skills. It’s the bridge that links business teams and technical teams when they are supported by a low-code platform. The idea is simple: empower business technologists to use low-code development tools to build applications that fit their needs. Meanwhile, IT can direct more of its focus towards managing security, data storage, and tackling other more complex projects typically reserved for highly trained coders.

Initially, citizen development was introduced as a way for business departments to create simple solutions with a local impact. However, with the arrival of the latest low-code platforms, citizen development for enterprise-grade applications is now possible.

The evolution of low-code has seen substantial changes from the first generation; where low-code tools were designed to accelerate development but were still technical platforms limited to use by IT, so citizen development was not possible. The second generation of tools saw the potential in citizen development and sharply redirected to support pure citizen developers. The problem here is that these second-generation tools are only suitable to build small applications with low impact, at the department level, because they generally lack the necessary governance and security capabilities. Citizen development works here, but there is a limit to the scalability and size of the solutions that can be created.

Today, third-generation low-code platforms like Aurachain can unlock the full potential of citizen development by providing the scalability, security, and governance tools needed to build enterprise applications.

Demand for business software will only continue to rise as companies continue to automate processes and offer new, digital products and services. It only makes sense, then, that these companies will also look to accelerate the delivery of new software wherever possible. This will see the citizen development trend continue to grow, with more and more organizations set to embrace the approach.

Companies who get citizen development right will be able to deliver business applications and automate processes at a faster pace than ever before. The question for those who choose a different path is simple: how do you plan to keep up?