The Challenges of Citizen Development

Citizen Development Governance

Citizen developers are more actively involved in software development than they have ever been. Analysts are increasingly expected to have a hand in creating their own data pipelines, business intelligence (BI) reports, or custom applications. This has been described as self-service, citizen development, and end user computing (EUC). Ultimately the name is irrelevant.

It all rests on the principle of bridging gaps between business and development. It must be managed and governed in an appropriate manner. This is becoming increasingly important.

One does not want a repeat of the old days of shadow IT. However, that is what is being risked if user-created assets exist without effective and holistic governance. At least Excel has only ever been a single tool.

This functionality could exist in every product in a software environment. One must understand where it is being used and what is happening to the resulting assets.

This paper examines the following:

• The current and changing state of EUC and citizen development
• The challenges and risks they pose to organizations
• How these risks are most effectively addressed while still realizing the benefits of the
  technologies involved