People, Process & Scalability
The goal of building an app is to eventually watch it grow in popularity. No business owner has ever said, “I’ll spend money on an app and hope it stays at the bottom of the download chart!”
Scalability is the end game for most apps, but it is more than just building the app and hoping someone downloads it in a crowded app store. Defining scalability—the balancing act between taking an application’s capacity to grow while maintaining its performance—should be top of mind for any organization developing or adapting applications.
Dozens of factors complicate scaling. Development teams must consider future-proofing code, responding quickly to scope or requirement changes, and focusing on the people involved: end users, developers, and designers.
People-first scaling demands thoughtful strategies on how best resources can efficiently meet customer needs while aiming for superior results. In this blog, our engineers and developers offer insights into the power of people and processes and how they work together to reach scalability goals.
What is scalability?
Scalability refers to the capability of expanding a system in a focused and strategic manner, allowing it to effectively handle increased traffic and accommodate growing demands. App scalability involves thorough documentation and the accumulation of knowledge right from the outset, ensuring a solid foundation for future growth.
When done right, scalability enables you to spend more time solving business vs. technical problems—and saves money in both coding and maintenance.
While there may be multiple approaches to achieving scalability, the key lies in carefully selecting one method and remaining consistent throughout the system’s development and evolution. By doing so, organizations can ensure the scalability of their systems and effectively adapt to changing needs and requirements.
Considerations for Scalability
- Clarify Your Goals: Engineering teams need to set crystal-clear goals to achieve scalability. Understand different ways to achieve scalability, including a surge in traffic, orders, sales users, or speed. Map out a timeline and budget for your scaling endeavors, ideally before you begin the project.
- Build for the Future: Launching a minimum viable product (MVP) is a quick and cost-effective way to get started on a small virtual machine. However, it’s crucial to approach it with a forward-looking perspective. Engineers and developers may need help with the temptation to optimize too soon, so leaving room for future optimization and app growth is vital.
- Plan for Scope Changes: In a project, it’s not a question of whether the scope changes but when it does. Scaling brings changing requirements in terms of technology and features. It is crucial to acknowledge this from the beginning while building. The key is to ensure extensibility.
People-First Scaling
Developers and engineers should remember that their creations are not solely meant for fellow developers (although a widely used application will inevitably involve interactions with many developers along the way). It is equally important to consider other stakeholders who will interact with the application, such as designers, stakeholders, and end users. Here are some valuable insights on scaling with a people-first approach.
Test Assumptions
Don’t rely on untested assumptions about what users want from an app. Users generally desire fast, high-quality, cost-effective solutions, but achieving all three can be challenging. Instead of presuming, ask the right questions. For example, inquire about the importance of loading videos quickly or whether security or speed takes precedence. You can gain valuable insights to guide your decisions by asking these pertinent questions.
Delay Decisions
Delay decisions as long as possible. Small decisions made over time can compound into something unattainable. This is especially true with end users, particularly in the case of native mobile apps. Users have specific expectations regarding how these apps should operate compared to web apps. While many things may change and evolve, having good, clean code will facilitate these changes. Investing time in writing quality code is always worthwhile.
Stay Focused
To achieve scalability, developers should decouple components to enable independent functionality, making updates more manageable. When considering mobile scaling, there are three key aspects to focus on:
- Evaluating how to scale new features effectively.
- Implementing compartmentalization to enable independent work for future developers joining the project.
- Developing strategies to ensure updates are tolerable.
Respect Your Team
You’ll undoubtedly add new team members who bring a fresh perspective to a complex project. However, it’s essential to carefully evaluate recommendations and changes. How one new person does something could lead to developing a bad habit that becomes the norm.
To scale an app with your people on top of your mind, it all comes down to respect. You’re all learning from one another, from the developer to the designer to the user who downloads. Focus on building a collaborative environment for everyone to be able to scale together.
Establishing a Process To Scale Your App
Maintaining and managing a project is crucial for building a solid code base. If you continuously onboard developers to work on an ever-expanding list of features, prioritizing your process becomes paramount. Avoid taking shortcuts and establish a robust foundation for long-term success. Here are a few tips for creating a process that will stick.
Defining a Process
When working with multiple developers, teams, and leaders, it is crucial to establish transparent processes. Leaders play a vital role in determining the essence of the application, while smaller teams focus on tackling specific feature sets. Frequently, these teams operate in parallel but independently, emphasizing the need for proper staffing and training to ensure consistency and seamless integration.
However, avoiding overstaffing is essential, as involving too many individuals can hinder progress. Research suggests that there is a tipping point where additional resources slow down progress in the wrong direction.
Documentation Matters
To mitigate potential issues, anticipate future questions from your team, establish well-defined tickets, clearly define your workflow and responsibilities, and clarify specific acceptance criteria.
Things To Watch Out For
Rushed coding can lead to sloppy development and an app vulnerable when scaled. Refactoring or restructuring the code without altering its original functionality may be necessary to address these issues. However, refactoring can pose a significant challenge when it comes to scaling, as it requires keeping the base code of the project intact, even as scope and requirements change. Refactoring can add years of work to the project, especially at the platform level.
Secret to Scaling: Value Your People & Process
Successful scaling of an application is not solely dependent on technology but equally hinges on the people involved and the processes they follow. People-first scaling, focusing on the suitable composition of teams, well-defined roles, and proper training, is integral to achieving streamlined operations and meeting project goals.
Equally important is establishing robust development processes, which guide the production of high-quality code and form the bedrock of a scalable application. Processes ensure an app remains resilient despite changing requirements. Scaling is about balancing the human element with the technical and ensuring that one complements the other.