Hello, and welcome back to the process and automation podcast with the automation guys. We had a couple of weeks now on the chat bots and RPA technologies. And today, we like to look a bit closer again what’s happening at low code, no code development? And why low code development is gaining a lot of traction right now.

And, um, yeah, for this, um, Um, we, we have an episode of 14 benefits to share with you. Yeah. Low code development, especially low code app development is scanning a lot of traction right now. And we are, we believe for really good reason. Um, the low code technologies, um, makes it really easy. Um, For, for everyone who is not like a programmer, not a technique, it has limited experience. And, uh, yeah, this allows everyone was that limited experience to build applications for both the web, the mobile, um, uh, versions, um, building enterprise applications and, um, uh, you know, small businesses as well. So it’s not just enterprise focus. Yeah. And, um, Yeah, we have really seen over the last month and years,  we have seen the evolution and benefits of low code development, really first hand.

We’re doing this day in, day out on, and I I’m working with several, several, um, uh, vendors in the low code, uh, application market. Um, and, uh, yeah, now, yeah, we have a lot of, uh, benefits we like to share with you. Um, and, uh, Yeah, let’s get started on what, what is your first one on the list? Well, so the first one is really just to do with the barrier of entry, um, the cost and deployment time associated with.

With low code apps and, you know, it’s one of the top reasons why tech pros love it. So low code development will really lower that barrier of entry and the cost and time it takes to deploy these types of applications, um, compared to conventional approaches. So, you know, it’s no longer do you need all of these sort of expert code coders in the background that is in it.

Uh, you know, for, for full development, but you know, you could use a field of experts in the field, um, to do some training on your low-code platform. I mean, and, you know, allow them to build out some of these productivity apps. I mean, we’ve seen an example where, um, we’ve deployed a low code application for NHS trust and even people like doctors and nurses.

Gets involved and help to configure the workflows and some of the electronic forms, you know, and, and that’s instead of sort of programmers that does this and, you know, and obviously with programmers, they don’t have any medical training, whether it’s. You look at this, this medically trained staff and they know the problem domain.

So, so solving their problem, using a low code application as it’s really quite easy, as long as they understand the constructs of how the application is put together using local. Yeah. That’s uh, yeah, I think it’s a real hyper in, in companies. So every department really likes to get started on the low code.

Um, especially, uh, Microsoft is doing a lots of, um, lots of publicity. And then, uh, yeah, it has to, has to sort of deliver that low code, but everyone can download it very quickly as well. I’ve been, see, see results, but it could be as well. Um, yeah, it has to be stored within the company. So with the right governance and it involvement, I think then it doesn’t get to get out of control.

Um, yeah, as we all know, um, uh, yeah, the next point is all about sort of legacy integration. Um, you know, we know that that low code development, um, really, really can increase agility, uh, in app development. So Forrester mentioned a while ago. Um, so you can speed up. Development by, um, uh, 10 times, 10 times to original or usual software development.

So the typical coding, uh, as we, as we all know it. So if you think this, um, as I look at this, um, so it can be, can be useful sorts of stuff, and they can also be used for, for integration of legacy mainframe systems. So, so instead of, uh, uh, Instead of sort of connecting to it complicated. So you can use sort of this local application as a new layer on top of it to, to connect to your mainframe systems and make this new, new, uh, stable, faster, resilient, um, uh, solutions available.

And, um, and with this new layer, which you were building was your low code applications, you can very quickly adapt to your new requirements. So it could also be seen, um, Maybe, um, make an ERP system more accessible, so not necessarily really legacy, but there are some really old legacy ERP systems out there instead of replacing them completely, you could keep the core out there and then use your app development, your low-code app development as a nice layer on top of it.

And, um, yeah. And, and put this innovation. Yeah. And I think a lot of times we see that, uh, people don’t want to replace their legacy systems. Um, and you know, a lot of times people have got more than one of the systems. So I think low code is really a good means to actually provide a facade in front of that and provide this really, really good.

Way to put a sort of digital workspaces that’s tailored around the persona of the person that uses it. And, um, you know, rather than having very complicated sort of legacy system interaction, what you could do is actually reuse your legacy system, integrate with it and really provide this, this very easy to use.

Um, interface that is kind of persona driven, that you understand the kind of user journey for the person that uses that. And it’s to the point. And I think that that really, uh, with the fact that development can be expedited quite quickly, in some cases, you know, like you said, up to 10, 10 times quicker than conventional, uh, methods, it’s very attractive way.

To actually, um, bring out these, these productivity apps to, to, you know, use this, to solve problems very quickly for them, um, and hiding complexity and noise behind the scenes. And again, I think Loco does not trying to. Uh, replace these legacy third-party systems. Of course you could, if you wish, but it’s really the game is to simplify and to kind of bring it into a realm where it’s, it’s kind of easy to, to bring these complex features to users.

Um, you know, without compromising functionality, but also just to hide certain things. That’s, that’s quite complicated. And again, you know, the thing, the point I want to touch on today is it’s the ability for, for low code to allow you to rapidly assemble solutions, um, and assembling these solutions doesn’t necessarily have to mean that you have to have a technical audience to do so.

You know, we live in a very hyper-personalized world and, um, you know, creating new solutions very quickly that behave similarly across all of these omni-channel ecosystems is, is a game changer for organizations and low code software. Platforms fast-track, you know, there’s this sort of digital programs by enabling a wider non-technical audience to, to rapidly assemble these solutions.

Aside from the availability of platforms, that are growing the excitement is that it breaks down traditional organizational barriers, which is really biting. And I think, you know, that kind of brings us to the next point where it speeds up these development cycles for us.

Absolutely. So if you, if you, if you have ideas, especially, um, last year, we all had to react as well, and everyone had to put forward ideas how to, how to manage a situation, um, where maybe businesses very disrupted. And, um, so yeah, it was all these new and, um, was easier ideas coming in. Um, these new innovative ideas maybe from within the business.

I think the desire is there usually to put these ideas into action very quickly. And, and instead of going to it, asking for implementation that that might take ages. So this was not really the right approach. So this is why everyone looked at local because it was local, um, development. Yeah, you can really, um, lower this barrier to entry for innovation.

Um, because of, um, this, um, there’s this easy drag and drop visual kind offer programming, everyone really was out coding experience can now really create this, um, this, um, web applications or digital. Products. So everyone was an idea can mock up very quickly, uh, functionality. Um, so, so then instead of looking at an implementation, maybe historically took, took maybe a couple of weeks or month, uh, you now can really reduce these development cycles to sometimes just a day.

So you have an idea in the morning and the evening, you already sit together and brainstorm on the next steps. So, and, um, because it’s. These platforms are so powerful. You have an immediate, so nearly flawless, uh, applications, uh, put together with, so there was no work or so these, these building blocks are, they’re very, very where we will put together the design user interfaces and all that usually is very, very appealing already out of the box.

So in, in, in a matter of minutes, actually, you can get really good things going and. And that’s absolutely game changing for lots of companies. I mean, you know, and you talk about exploiting business ideas, but you could really use low code to automate, uh, you know, a new business idea within minutes, you know, um, you know, we are living in a world where, business ideas, pop up new opportunities.

And with low-code you, you, you know, you could literally automate that in very, very quick time. And that’s one of the most exciting benefits we think of, of, uh, of low code development. Um, and, and, and what it provides for, you know, for organizations, um, and, you know, looking into the future.

I think, you know, a lot of people will look at it and say, You know, I can do that. I can take a problem. I’m not a developer, but I can use this technology to actually create a application that I can solve the problem with inside my business, you know, without it involvement. And, um, you know, and I think locate is one of those capabilities that can equip any employee with inside of business to create powerful tools to improve operational efficiency.

And I think that’s really important. And this is not just from a, uh, a sort of, uh, uh, a fact that, you know, People to be able to, to create capabilities, to solve problems, but also it’s a really good place for ideation. You know, if there’s a particular problem and rather than reaching for a spreadsheet, you know, why not use a low-code platform to actually try and make that problem go?

Um, you know, with, with, without reaching for that dreaded spreadsheet. Right. And I think this is exactly what these platforms are designed for. Um, and what we seeing is that a lot of this, um, you know, the, the people that adopted the so-called citizen developers actually do use it, maybe sometimes for ideation and then the bigger ideas can then turn into.

Quite strategic systems that it involvement can then be used to actually embedded deeper with inside the organization with all the governance. So, so it is a really, really good place to innovate. It’s a really good place to fast, quick to fail quickly. You have an idea and it’s not going to work, um, without a massive cost burden.

Absolutely. Uh, I think, um, we all, we all know generally software development goes sort of lots of testing cycles and, um, yeah, lots of quality assurance, uh, end user testing, um, all that. So, so this. Yeah, quite expensive in general and tedious and slow. So this is why low code can help here as well. You have low code, you have these ready to go components.

These, these, these Lego bricks where you can use and, and these, these ready to go components are already tested. So functioning. So they are put to put forward by. Uh, by vendors and partners of these platforms and they just work out of the box and you can just pluck their name and, um, yeah. Uh, you can, uh, build these application super fast.

Uh, you have fewer bugs, um, less integration issues because these connectors and interfaces, API interface already ready, developed, and. So, yeah, this is, this is a much, much more enjoyable, um, uh, process really for not just for the developers. I think for everyone, um, uh, being involved in this, uh, in his innovative project work.

Um, and overall I think not just developers like it, everyone in the business likes it because it produces faster values, not a better. Yeah, exactly. And also, you know, I think what we allow people to do is to be creative and it’s the sort of so-called rise of the citizen developer and I think, you know, again, my analogy with an Excel spreadsheet still stands where.

You know, shadow it, wasn’t born out of the fact that conventional it systems couldn’t do what business people wanted to do. So a lot of these sort of business users thought themselves really good skills using Excel, perhaps a bit of VBA. And, um, you know, what we want to do is kind of bring those people into this domain where we.

Give them the ability to have a better alternative, you know, they, there’s a constant demand for software and applications and you know, most it departments simply cannot keep up with this. And this is where the developer comes into play, where we’ve got these, non-professionals building these business apps.

You know, with, with existing low code tools that is obviously sanctioned by it because, you know, they, they still have the, the governance responsibility. So, so we provide the guard rails for these citizens developers to create these solutions again, without actually having to resort to using Excel, they can build, uh, applications that’s available online, centralized.

In nature, um, available, um, you know, to all their colleagues, for example, um, you know, so, and again, with the, the, the, the reason why this works is it’s, you know, there’s, there’s less or no code involved, you know, for, for this type of development path. So citizen developers can quickly, um, create these much needed apps to make them more, um, sort of productive and more efficient.

And this building block approach. You talk about this, this circle kind of Lego blocks, um, really cuts down on development time and that, and that translates to faster time to value where it’s needed. So if you have a form that needs to go through a specific workflow, maybe it’s a document approval, stay out of outlook, you know, create.

Um, ensure that the document can be attached to that form, create a workflow that can actually route the form to the various, uh, signatories or people that needs to review it. Automatically you get tracking automatically. You get all the stats automatically. You get the ability to change your workflow in bed, business rules, within sight at workflow, and potentially grow that into something larger with inside your organization and adopt these best practices as a blueprint, going forward to install some of these operational efficiencies again, without having dark data and Excel and these dark processes with inside outlook.

Right. Yeah, that’s, that’s very useful. Yeah. Um, and every, everyone really should look at, look at that. Everyone who’s listening today, um, should, should look out for, um, for what we have published on our podcast. So far about low code, because not just low code apps, isn’t that this is really something we. We see in other areas, as well as a low code RPA or robotic process automation, digital, um, workforce digital workers, uh, could be built as well as low code approach.

Um, um, we, we cover chatbots was the low code approach. So, so many, so many areas. So that’s um, so these, these are typically areas where you looked at before. Um, and thought, yeah, we need experts. We need experts coming in to do all these things. These are the automations, these, uh, these applications and experts are rare.

Um, and because of this, this huge demand for automation everywhere, think no one can really keep up with skilling up people, uh, uh, on these technologies in general, on this expert skills, um, uh, without, yeah, with low code. Now we can, we can bring all that, that stuff, um, to really everyone. And that increases the productivity across teams really.

And.Yeah, businesses and business teams can create their own applications. As soon as we mentioned already, uh, uh, was out waiting for the developers. Um, uh, you just need some, maybe some developers to do like checking if best practices have been followed that kind of stuff before, maybe deploying.

But generally if the, if the rules are clear to everyone, you don’t even need a developer. And then yeah, because there’s no complex code to, to look at, um, Yeah, really, every team member. Can really contribute and that enhances productivity enormously. And, um, yeah, you mentioned that was the ideation. I think that’s, that’s the key really.

Everyone can feel empowered, um, to, to contribute with new ideas. So we were talked about, uh, maybe a few times. This idea of management process. Yeah. Um, uh, I think this is, this is a very important thing, um, which comes up more and more how, uh, how can you improve the business in general? And I think, um, something like this, low-code, um, a powerful tool, um, for everyone.

Um, yeah, I think it’s not just writing down business ideas. You can actually start up a business idea within the business and, um, Get everyone excited. Uh, that was really, really nice. And, yeah. And if you, if you put this out to like chatbots RPA in some other areas, uh, I think the possibilities are really, really enormous.

Yeah. It is quite broad. And I think, you know, if you do have, if you do take away the, kind of the complexity of, um, development from, from. From people, um, you know, low-code really increases access for more people to, to, to, you know, to, to use ideation, to create more. So it really brings me to the next point.

Um, and that’s really, you know, we, we trying to democratize democratize software development for, for users. So we want to grant grant users access to, um, you know, technical and business expertise such as. You know, data analysis, machine learning, or even app development, um, you know, without having a very steep learning curve.

So with low code, it’s quite easy to grasp some of the constructs to put an application together and even use quite sophisticated tools. Like I said, machine learning, learning, and incorporate that into your apps. Um, so, so, so really it’s, it’s no longer necessary to be a senior technical developer. Um, you know, to use these highly specialized tools, um, and systems with insight, your work, and of course, don’t, you know, that accelerates the ability for yourself as a non-technical person to solve these problems very rapidly using low code.

Yeah. I think that’s a, um, that brings us to the next one. Uh, something you might have heard before bridging the tech divide. Um, yeah, so local platforms. Really enable us to be more agile, faster, and, um, the ante to, to really get our development cycles down. Um, we, we mentioned this, uh, early on a few points.

Yeah. So was this latest, um, visual programming techniques, um, uh, was in these platforms? Um, Arno, which one is a, is one on one. You prefer them all. Oh, I like them all. You like them all? Yeah, exactly. We, we, we work with so many, so just getting in touch at some point, uh, uh, um, on the, on the automation guys.net website and to, to learn more about what, what is available and give you good insight on that.

So, but was this, uh, visual programming techniques, um, offered by, by these local platforms? Uh, Really directly built and very often directly in the cloud. So you don’t even have to set up a service for that. Um, so you can sign up and after five minutes you can start building and iterating, uh, on solutions, uh, very, very fast.

And yeah, I think that’s, that’s a, that’s a big. Um, bake efficiency and productivity booster. Um, I think every really every business should look at every everything else should they add are very complex, uh, situations you might need to need to look at. Um, but typically, probably it’s this 80 20 rule again, um, where you probably can solve most of the, uh, business problems.

Uh, Um, today was, was low-code applications. And then for the remaining 20, um, you, you go through the traditional coding, maybe, um, this is why it’s called low code terms. You can still code when it’s needed. Um, but otherwise, uh, yeah, it is really an efficiency and productivity poster and, uh, yeah, we love all the local platforms.

It is just a concept of it. That’s appealing to me. And, you know, it kind of brings me to the next point. Um, it’s, it’s the ability to rapidly prototype out a solution to a problem. And, you know, that’s one of the strongest benefits of using low code is that it allows sort of non-coding. Prototype solutions to real-world problems very quickly.

And like I said earlier to fail quickly, um, you know, you might face a particular problem. Like I said earlier, RA rather than kind of carving out a manual process using an Excel spreadsheet or a document you download somewhere from your intranet that gets emailed across outlook. It’s very easy to actually assemble a automated solution.

You know, using low code, if you’re a non-technical developer, um, you know, these solutions can be tested, evaluated, and then, you know, redefined or re refined, uh, you know, as you, as you, as you progress. Um, and you don’t have to have an involvement from. Uh, you know, formal kind of software development staff within a site, it, for example, um, and you can compare competing solutions, um, and you can discard some that, that that’s not relevant or that you feel it doesn’t work well.

And also you could merge certain solutions at some point that you feel is as is mature enough to. It’d be passed on to the, you know, for more formal development, um, and, and, and, you know, for more kind of optimal implementation. So I think the, the name of the game here is let’s solve a problem quickly.

Let’s bring value. Very quickly as it scales and grows, let’s involve the right stakeholders, you know, the people in it and, and show them what we’ve done and, you know, assist them, you know, get their assistance to, to, to, to sort of bring that into the business and, and build that further. So I think it’s, Eddie’s, there’s kind of this ultimate ideation platform where instead of the ideas kind of just being in your head or floating around somewhere in Excel, Um, you know, it’s kind of bringing it out to a centralized place and, you know, we could pick the best of the bunch and progress them forward, um, to, to really, uh, invest further in them.

And, um, like I said, uh, you know, take some of those best ideas and turning those into two really, really good strategic solutions. And potentially scale that out across the business. And the good thing here is that, you know, if you have people that, um, you know, are sort of sharp minded and they like solving problems, I think this is a great platform to put in front of them to allow them to sell, solve those problems.

And. Insight that area, where they solve the problems and pick the best ones that you think could potentially be a sort of a game changer across your business. And then scale that out, you know, and roll that out. And it is about innovation. But it’s about quick innovation, fast innovation with inside the business is really key.

I think that if you do innovate, the technology should be, uh, appropriate for that. You could have really great business ideas, but if you then rely on, on antiquated technologies, then that actually provides a handicap for, for that innovation. And I think low-code is, uh, is a, is a means to eradicate that because what we achieving is that we can bake those reasons.

Innovation ideas into something that is by default scalable, and also by default, that could be, um, you know, evolve into something better and bigger. And I think that that is really the key and doing all of that, you know, uh, 20 times or 10 times quicker than conventional developments, really, really powerful capability with inside business.

Yeah. Usually what we hear, um, when it comes to this, so all we want to be fast and we want to develop faster, um, uh, um, than, uh, Very often it comes on, but conscious develop something. It needs to be secure. It needs to be scalable, not just the idea needs to be scalable, actually. Um, what you’re developing as a solution needs to be scalable.

It needs to follow certain sort of rules, et cetera. So, and this is where these local platforms also supporting, uh, developers or the local developers because. These vendors have thought about making security easy, um, high, highly, obviously on a high level enterprise scale security, sort of easy. And, um, you don’t have to worry about building security modules and all that stuff does out of the box available.

Um, these platforms. Uh, when, when you go to the cloud with these vendors directly, um, so they usually give you, um, a sort of an, a development environment, a testing environment, a production environment, and that production environment then scales automatically like most things in the cloud these days. So if you have done a wider adoption across your business, um, so the, the infrastructure behind that, um, uh, or.

Production system, the life system is then growing to security around that is, you know, you can trust. So, so suddenly then it can also look at this bit more relaxed. Should I need to know about these vendors and generally say, okay. Find they’re supporting this and this and this kind of a standard. So now yeah, you all are good to go.

And then, um, was this a mind, um, you can really faster innovate, um, um, was in the business, um, because you can be rest assured that everything will be fine. You will not have a data breach and, um, you can just concentrate on. Yeah, exactly. And I think low code solve all of those technical IT problems for you.

Like you say, scalability, um, because you know, Most, uh, low code software we use has got opposite cloud offering. They are some on prem offerings, as well as security is of concern, or, you know, you need to keep your data on prem, but the other way, you know, you, you fundamentally solve a lot of those. IT central problems immediately and what you could focus on them.

It’s really just to focus on that problem you want to solve. And, you know, and it kind of brings us to our next point, which, which local provides you the freedom to focus on. Um, you know, business development, so providing ability for, for, uh, people to actually, um, build apps that actually solve problems for themselves.

So, you know, like you’ve seen with, with modern website builders, for example, um, you know, low code allows people to build. Uh, you know, in the same fashion, simple applications that are actually quite surprisingly complicated to code, if you didn’t use, uh, you know, low code for example, and you know, this allows people to focus more on the business side of things and solving those business problems.

And, you know, you could build a. And minimal viable solution or minimum viable product very quickly, get it out, get feedback adapted on the fly and you don’t necessarily have to escalate costs in doing so. So it’s a very exciting in a agile way to, to introduce solutions with inside your business very quickly, and then evolve them into long-term solutions and long-term, you know, sort of capabilities.

Um, that, that scales across your business. Yeah, that’s a, that’s very powerful. Um, and, uh, I think the, the, the last, the last point we want to address is. It’s not just, just for businesses or for, for larger businesses. Um, um, so low code can be really for everyone. So for the, for everyone, for, for every entrepreneur out there.

Um, so it was a good business idea in general. Or if you, if you feel like you are an entrepreneur within the organization, you can. That way as well as he can just take that and build something. Um, if you, if you just starting up with your own business idea, let’s assume you’re a startup. Um, you need to put something together.

You can use a low code to just come up with these ideas and these applications, you probably can get your first version of your SAS offering or so already built on. On some of these local platforms very easily. Uh, you can prove from the, the division you have, you can build your MVP as a, as a SaaS platform, potentially already was a local platform, um, without really putting this huge investment in an external it companies potentially, uh, or when you, within the business, uh, you reducing the expenditure of, um, maybe expensive external consultants.

Yeah. So, so basically you can get just more things done, um, was less, uh, less capital and then less time, uh, um, time spent. Yeah, I think that’s a, that’s, that’s very powerful in general. Um, so yeah, if you’d like to learn more about low-code, um, not just low-code app development, um, um, and, uh, yeah, it wasn’t or no code app development.

So if you, if you’d like to learn more about everything, you know, just visit our website, the automation guys.net, um, there you find a lots of, uh, resources, lots of content. Um, I think, uh, you know, w we have, uh, what else do we have our clubhouse? We have a weekly clubhouse session. You can chat about low-code with us.

Um, and all things, automation, um, Yeah, I think, uh, we have a community let’s talk automation, community everywhere where you search, I think on Google, you will find it. You can, uh, be part of it and join in. And, um, yeah. And hopefully you take a few inspirations from this, um, from this episode, um, I think the most important thing is.

Uh, I think the takeaway is you can just do do it and get started a thing there’s no barrier really anymore. Um, there there’s there’s anything, uh, their, their software, their software out there on any sort of price range. Um, so there’s no reason to not get started. Um, and do you get, get the benefits out of low code or any, any final thoughts?

Yeah, like you said, Sasha, it’s obviously, um, low-code is a discipline where traditionally we see it as workflow automation, electronic forms and make this available in, um, various devices, mobile desktop tablet devices. Um, but what we see is that, of course. Most of the technologies with inside the hyper automation space, and this include a chat bot, robotic process automation, what we call low code automation or, you know, traditional workflow, um, artificial intelligence, um, you know, all of these are.

Uh, or do you leverage Low code principles? And it’s really exciting to get started with, you know, all of these different elements of automation to assemble business solutions very quickly. And you could start very quickly. A lot of these platforms. Allows you to sign up, get started, trial it out and really kind of kick the tires to get started.

And I think for me, it’s all about innovation. It’s all about taking these business problems and looking at these platforms and looking at a way to get started, really, to dip your toe in that. And really just to, to, to get a good direction, um, I’ve traveled for, for solving problems. That you know, you have with, with manual processes, um, for example, and, and, and.

Automating those repetitive tasks using RPA or getting rid of that Excel spreadsheet that gets sent around the office, for example. So it’s a very exciting time. I think there’s a lot to talk about Sascha future episodes, which we’re obviously looking forward to, like Sascha said, you know, please reach out to us if you have any questions or suggestions, or if there’s anything on your mind that you.

Perhaps I see a problem with inside your business. That’s noteworthy to, to, to, um, uh, to talk about on this episode, feel free to reach out to us. Um, you know, like I said, there’s a lot of things in the future. That’s, that’s going to be very exciting. We’re going to continue the conversation and hopefully, uh, you know, get people to automate, you know, I think that that’s the goal, right?

Absolutely. Yeah. If there’s any, anything you’d like to share with us, a specifically submitted topic, on our website, the automationguys.net. there we collect all the feedback and all the suggestions for future episodes and we had tremendous feedback so far  and lots of these ideas of what come from your suggestions.

So yeah, if you want us to talk about something or you like a specific interview guest on the show, or you would be interested to hear from that person, just let, let us know. And yeah, I think that’s it for today. Again, thank you for joining in.

Unfortunately, that’s it again with this episode of the process and automation podcast. If you liked this episode, please give us a five-star rating and don’t forget to subscribe to this podcast so you don’t miss any upcoming episode. We hope you will tune in next time. And until then let’s automate.