What is Lean Software Development?
Lean software development is a software development framework derived from the same principles of Agile practices. Lean software development focuses on process improvements to eliminate waste, improve product quality, and deliver fast. To achieve this, the lean software development teams will typically build a bare-bones solution and then rely on user feedback to optimize the product.
The lean methodology takes inspiration from the manufacturing industry to build its philosophy. The lean philosophy that encourages development teams to minimize waste originated from lean manufacturing when manufacturers were determined to reduce waste in assembly lines to increase customer value.
The lean development methodology wasn’t applied to the software industry until 2003, when the Lean Software Development book was published, impacting the industry for years to come. Lean development gained ample attraction once developers started to discuss it at Agile conferences.
The Seven Principles of Lean Software Development
After reviewing the origin of the lean methodology, let’s take a look at the seven lean principles that make up lean development.
Waste Elimination
As expected from a methodology inspired by lean manufacturing, an essential principle of lean software development is to eliminate waste. What is considered “waste” will depend on the project and development team. Because of this, team leads will have to carefully examine all aspects of a project before declaring pieces as wasteful.
Some examples of waste in a software development project include:
- Poorly written code that needs to be reworked
- A weak understanding of project requirements resulting in incorrect code
- Abandoned features leading to unfinished work
- Poor management skills leading to work overload and constant task handoffs
- Not properly documenting software development practices throughout the production process
Knowing the areas where waste is common will allow team leaders to identify waste and properly eliminate it. This allows lean development teams to prioritize their time and produce quality software effectively.
Inherent Quality Assurance
The success of a software product will typically rely on the user experience, meaning quality assurance testing is essential to the development process. Since lean development strives to improve the overall quality of the product, delivering a product with bugs and inaccuracies would go against the lean philosophy.
To deliver a software product that ensures a seamless user experience, lean development teams should test the software throughout the development process and fix bugs as they are identified. By correcting errors as they’re identified, development teams lessen the risk of a bug fix breaking other components of the software.
While quality assurance testing is one of the principles of lean software, it’s a delicate balance to ensure teams don’t spend so much time testing that it creates waste. Working with a software development team experienced in the lean development methodology and familiar with test-driven development will reduce the risk of waste from testing.
Knowledge Enhancement
In lean software development, gaining and sharing knowledge among developers will improve the overall quality of the product. This shared knowledge can include expertise in specific technologies, an understanding of the project requirements, and context switching with ease.
Going back to the first principle we reviewed, by enhancing the team’s knowledge base for a project, lean development teams can reduce waste and increase customer value. Relearning different technologies or requirements takes time, and when a developer incorrectly builds a feature, that is a significant time waste that has to be made up elsewhere.
Deferred Decision-Making
Deferring any critical decisions regarding software development is a key principle of lean development. The software industry is ever-changing, and as time goes on, customer expectations are growing. Depending on the length of the development project, various requirements or features might need to be changed or reprioritized based on the market.
To successfully avoid getting stuck building irrelevant features or processes, lean development teams should defer commitment until the last responsible moment. This will ensure the lean developers working on the product can make any changes required without having to rewrite all of their code.
Rapid Delivery
Rapid delivery is an essential principle for lean software development since it pushes for the reduction of waste during the development process. When developers are focused on producing code on a tighter schedule, they are less likely to waste time on non-essential items.
Developing in iterative sprints lasting two to four weeks will allow development teams to focus on their development efforts for the near future rather than being intimated by the total amount of work that needs to be completed for the entire project.
Working in iterative cycles allows development teams to demo the product features to the client to get customer feedback. This gives development teams the information needed to optimize the features, ensuring the team is building quality software.
Employee Respect
To build quality products, software development companies must prioritize a healthy working environment that supports and respects its employees. Creating a supportive culture among development teams leads to innovation and reduces burnout among developers. Employees need to feel supported and secure in their role to engage in healthy conflict that could improve the overall product quality.
While employee wellness might not initially seem like a development principle, employees are building and testing the product, which directly impacts the development quality. By respecting employees and trusting them to perform their jobs without micromanagement, they’ll have more confidence in their work and end up producing better results.
Whole-System Optimization
The last of the seven lean principles we’ll review today is optimizing the system as a whole instead of breaking it up into separate pieces. When lean software development teams have a solid understanding of the entire project, there are fewer chances for simple misunderstandings to generate waste.
To optimize the whole system, ensure development teams have a solid understanding of the product they are developing, the reason behind it, and how the users will interact with it. This will ensure developers are not building a product that works against the strategy of the solution.
Analyzing the Pros and Cons of Lean Software Development
We’ve reviewed the principles of lean software development. Now, let’s take a look at the pros and cons of lean thinking.
Pros of Lean Software Development
- Faster Delivery: Lean development encourages development teams to spend less time on redundant tasks and instead focus on the essential aspects of the product, allowing them to deliver fast. This allows development teams to focus their efforts on building high-quality software without the risk of scope creep, decreasing the time to market.
- Improved Collaboration: Several of the lean principles lead to a collaborative atmosphere among development teams. With a better understanding of the project, development teams can work together in an effective and efficient manner.
- Increased Flexibility: As a software development approach built from the Agile methodology, lean principles make it easier for development teams to make changes to the product throughout the development process. Being able to make changes as the software is being developed reduces the overall waste and scope creep.
Cons of Lean Software Development
- Requires Strong Documentation: To use the lean approach for software development successfully, development teams must have strong documentation skills. The goal of documentation is to reduce the time spent on relearning processes and technologies required to build the product. If team members are not able to document their work accurately and detailed enough, then the time wasted will be significant.
- Relies on Knowledge: Like most software development methodologies, the lean approach requires team members to have a thorough understanding of the project and various aspects of the final product. If even one team member has a gap in understanding of the project or the requirements, then the project could be thrown off its timeline, and unnecessary features will be developed.
- Depends on Team Engagement: In order for the lean methodology to work, all team members must be willing to collaborate and engage with each other while working in a high-communication environment. While this is an ideal environment for some employees, others may not perform well in an environment that requires this level of communication and engagement on a daily basis.
Incorporating Lean Principles into Telehealth Software Development
After covering all the necessary aspects of lean development, let’s look at how it can be incorporated into telehealth software development.
Idea Generation Stage
The first step to building a telehealth platform is planning out all aspects of the solution, including the user interface, various workflows, and user permissions. Project leads will work with the client to determine what the application needs to encompass to ensure everything is covered during future phases. This includes all the requirements that are needed for the software to function correctly and allow healthcare providers to serve patients effectively.
Designing Stage
The designing stage is when the software development company creates high-fidelity mockups of the different pages in the telehealth app to give stakeholders a chance to see what the product will look like. This also gives the client a chance to provide feedback and make any changes before development starts.
Development/Coding Stage
During the development stage, the software development team will build the telehealth solution following the iterative model. By developing in iterative cycles, the development team can provide clients with real-time updates and demos throughout the project’s development cycle.
Quality Assurance Stage
Quality assurance is an essential step if development teams want to build quality software. After features are developed, they will be thoroughly tested to discover and resolve any bugs. This ensures that the final product provides a seamless user experience.
Roll-out Stage
Once all the previous stages are complete, the final telehealth solution will be ready to roll out. What all deployment includes depends on the software development company. This stage can also include training services, testing support, and risk management advice.
Work with Geneca Today
If your healthcare organization is ready to build a telehealth application that improves your operations, contact Geneca today for a commitment-free consultation! We have experienced development teams with ample knowledge of the healthcare industry, ready to bring your software to life.