Over the past few years I’ve been a kind of informal adviser to the Defrag event. The role is less than onerous, Eric Norlin totally understands what his participants (and at defrag, attendees really are participants and not simply an audience) most want to see. Defrag has always been a mind expanding event – it brings together a diverse selection of both participants and topics and weaves a common thread of looking to the future of the world in general, and technology in particular.

Earlier this year I was talking with Eric and suggested that there was a real convergence occurring, one that sees a new breed of organization, a changing environment within which those organizations operate, and a new type of demand upon those within the organization tasked with delivering the business needs. This last theme is something that my friend Abhinav Keswani has often talked about, both in his current guise of head of bespoke development for Trineo, and in his previous life running development teams within a large enterprise. Abhinav brings a zen-like perspective to technology within an enterprise, and I encouraged Eric to have a conversation with him about what part this might play within the Defrag agenda.

My introduction seemed to be the catalyst for a great conversation and Eric invited Abhinav to present a keynote at Defrag about the Ethic of Delivery. Abhinav used his own example of leading a “black ops” team within an enterprise – an experiment which was (and still is frankly) highly unusual in the tightly constrained world of enterprise IT. It was also an experiment that ultimately failed – but we can learn much out of the process and system that Abhinav and his team developed within the organization, and see the learnings from that experience that he has applied to his role within Trineo today.

I firmly believe we are entering a period of extreme change for enterprises, and with the paradigm change comes a need for a new model of delivery – one in which developers are empowered to achieve their outcomes outside of tight control of the tools, processes and models they use. Abhinav’s presentation sounds both a warning bell, and a clarion call for those involved in delivery outcomes, enabled through technology, within enterprises. Do yourself a favor and invest 30 minutes to watch his presentation.

Ben Kepes

Ben Kepes is a technology evangelist, an investor, a commentator and a business adviser. Ben covers the convergence of technology, mobile, ubiquity and agility, all enabled by the Cloud. His areas of interest extend to enterprise software, software integration, financial/accounting software, platforms and infrastructure as well as articulating technology simply for everyday users.

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