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Philosophy

Intelliware’s core development philosophy has been strongly influenced by Lean Manufacturing principles.  As originally articulated by Taiichi Ohno of Toyota[1], there are seven core Lean Manufacturing principles:

  • Create a continuous process flow to bring problems to the surface.
  • Use "pull" systems to avoid overproduction.
  • Level out the workload.
  • Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time.
  • Push responsibility to those adding value.
  • Provide visual feedback to ensure no problems are hidden.
  • Use reliable, thoroughly tested technology.

It is our belief that these common sense process principles apply equally well to software development as they do to manufacturing. This belief has been reinforced by our concrete experience over hundreds of projects, large and small, over the past ten years. We believe our process success is attributable to the same principles that have made Toyota such a success.

These Lean Manufacturing principles have strongly influenced a number of different approaches to software development, with core values that are widely shared by the broader Agile software development community. Intelliware has been involved with the Agile community since the core concepts were framed by Kent Beck[2] in the late 1990's. We remain active participants and leaders in this community to this day. As a small example, we currently host our local XP User Group.

For those interested in a more thorough discussion about Agile software development, please see the Agile and Lean Software Development reference links in our Knowledge Centre. Also, for a detailed look at Intelliware’s adoption of the Lean principles articulated above, we have resource materials in the i-Proving section of the Knowledge Centre.

Although much of the focus of the outstanding literature on Agile software development is on the core coding process itself, the Lean principles articulated above really apply to a wide range of services. Intelliware’s service offerings are all influenced by the bottom-up, hands-on, get it done, common sense philosophies espoused decades ago by manufacturing’s leading thinkers.

1 Adapted from Liker, J. 2004. "The 14 Principles of the Toyota Way: An Executive Summary of the Culture Behind TPS", p. 37. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan.

2 Beck, K. 1999. "Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change", Addison-Wesley Professional