My first blog post

After many years in the making, my first book has finally been published. I’m thrilled to announce that I’m now holding the first printed copy in my hands. The thing that surprised me most about making such a project a reality was just how many people would be involved. I’d really like to thank everyone who has contributed in a big or small way.

Although some of my helpers and myself tried hard to come up with a shorter title, we finally agreed on “Guide to Software Projects for Business People”—a shorter name would suggest that the book was for IT people, which it isn’t.

The target audience is non-techies who are somehow involved in software projects. From my personal and professional experience, this group can sometimes involve a fair number of people. If, for example, you’re planning an App or another kind of tech start-up, your close involvement in the software project will be crucial. Whether you’re in business, sales, marketing, law, government or any other non-tech area, your collaboration will be essential for a successful outcome.

There are various great books out there to help leaders tackle the “digital transformation” from a management perspective, and I’ve dedicated a few chapters to this group too. Very few cohesive sources are available for non-techies though, despite the fact that a large part of project success depends on business and IT teams executing their work well together. For this reason, I’ve made a point of specifically addressing the non-techies here. Although some sections of tech books and other sources do include relevant information for non-techies, I doubt whether many business people read these technical books.

I’ve tried to make this book accessible to a non-techie audience—and as enjoyable and informative as possible. I started off by collecting ideas partly from my own day-to-day experiences and partly from those of my colleagues and clients as well. Over the last 2½ years I’ve spent a lot of my spare time turning this collection into a guide that I hope you’ll enjoy. The illustrations, mostly hand-drawn, will help you visualize the metaphors and analogies.

I hope you find the book useful—I’d really appreciate your feedback! Please feel free to get involved—I envisage this blog as a growing source of information to help others towards more successful software projects that are also lots of fun.