In today’s digital world, software development has become a highly demanding skill. If you have a development team in your company, you need to be creative in the way you interact with them to achieve the best level of productivity. Software development technology changes rapidly, and you need the right people on your team to keep up with these changes.
But even if you don’t work for a software development company, you may still need to know the technologies that handle most of the demands of your clients. In this article, you’ll learn ten strategies you can use for your team and your company to improve software development productivity:
Use The Agile Methodology
The use of the agile approach is gaining recognition among many software development teams. These teams typically create an Agile release plan where they carefully plan product releases to improve their workflow. It’s said that early testing and releasing can lower delays and dependencies, which highly boosts your team’s productivity.
Release planning helps you focus on certain product features, work on them, and then release them into the market. You and your team need to evaluate the scope of the product, date of release and set aside the resources you need to work on for short sprints. Your team doesn’t work on a whole product but segments it into small iterations instead. For example, a software preferred by many for Agile production is Jira software, which can help plan each sprint properly and allow collaboration.
Explore Cutting-Edge Technologies
To stand out in the software industry, you need to implement the most productive technology. You don’t need to settle for outdated methods. Cultivate a culture of exploration and learning to minimize the chances of your team becoming disinterested and stagnant. Find the latest solutions to problems, expose your team to discoveries, and embrace some changes as early as possible.
Welcoming new ideas enables your team to become more innovative and gives them a better productive-developer experience. Some high-end technologies you can use are GraphQL, React, React Native, Serverless, and Kubernetes.
Work Fewer Hours
If you don’t observe this kind of practice, it may sound counterintuitive. However, if imposed properly, this can actually enhance your team’s productivity. Due to the limited working hours, you’re meant to focus on the task at hand. You’ll also become more focused on looking for the best solutions to finish your product with the limited time you have.
Have Feedback Loops
Getting feedback from your customers can help your team become more engaged with the users of your product. Soliciting feedback can be an excellent way for your team to get real-time information about product bugs and missing features. Through this, they can instantly update these missing features and remove errors. You can accomplish this by using a multi-channel feedback approach, analyzing, making the necessary changes and implementing them, and receiving more feedback.
Minimize Distractions
Programming tools, apps, and platforms require you to learn them thoroughly from the core level to the highest level, thus, the need for focus. It could take about 15 means to refocus once you’ve been distracted. When your programmers get distracted while solving complex problems, they might encounter difficulties tracing their trail of thoughts again. Thus, you must create a conducive quiet environment for your team.
To minimize distractions, you can use chat apps among colleagues rather than calling them. You may turn off notifications, use physical barriers, put up signages such as ‘don’t disturb,’ or provide notices that your team isn’t available to chat.
Get Enough Sleep
Due to time constraints, you may find yourself having to work for long hours just to meet deadlines and goals. If you’ve been working all day long then late into the night, chances are, you may be unable to work well the following day. Denying yourself enough time to sleep makes you feel lethargic which negatively affects your productivity.
On the other hand, quality sleep helps you become more focused, make better decisions, and boost your memory. You can get good sleep by:
Having a consistent sleep pattern to help your body program itself properly and boost the possibilities of a deep sleep cycle
Keeping all gadgets away about an hour before you go to bed. You may also turn off all these gadgets
Planning for the next day before going to sleep to avoid anxiety and overthinking
Assign Tasks Wisely
Every member of your team has certain things they’re passionate about. You need to ask them about the tasks they love doing and create a database of skill profiles. In every software development project, allocate tasks to people according to their strengths so that you can maximize their productivity. You may find that your team becomes happier and takes a shorter time to complete a project.
Read Extensively
You need to keep on improving your knowledge by studying many books and online information. Go to YouTube and watch tutorials of any subject that gives you challenges. There are several subjects you can read about such as project management, different programming languages, and technologies. Most of these materials include insights from experts who have been in the field for decades and are more than willing to share their experiences. You can also benefit from the tips given to stay away from possible pitfalls.
Hire Mentors
Even though you can get a lot of help from the internet, the role of a mentor should not be underestimated. There are things you may not find on the internet. With a mentor, you’ll have the opportunity to delve into how they succeeded and explore other avenues outside of regular coding that you can use for professional development. If you’re unable to hire a mentor near you, there are several online platforms where you can find one.
Automate Tasks
Automation can help you reduce writing the same code in repetition. That being said, you’ll have enough time to focus on other tasks. For example, you may be required to move your data to the database every time you make changes and updates. To deal with this tedious task, you can use code generation tools or write a code that can perform the task for you.
Conclusion
Implementing the strategies given in this article can help you accomplish more as a team and as a company. All you have to do is use Agile, automate repetitive tasks, assign tasks to your team according to their skill sets, solicit feedback from users, and never stop learning.