Active Listening and Open-Mindedness are Hallmarks of Successful IT Engagements: New White Paper

Knowing and understanding the business needs of your client long before beginning to write the code holds the key to gaining better outcomes from IT projects, says Nearshore Americas’ latest white paper.
Strategic Ventures in IT: How to Build and Sustain Powerful IT Partnerships covers a wide range of issues that service providers face in building new partnerships, and walks you through key techniques to win your partners’ trust.
To paint a clear picture, the white paper utilizes the experiences and success stories of Inflection Point Systems, a software product development company headquartered in Columbia, MD.
A  key exploration area is around using an agile approach for building the right strategic engagement, while domain expertise, corporate structure, and the technological focus are critical differentiators.
Furthermore, an intelligent software developer will learn the business needs of his client and estimate the potential impact his software will have on the client’s business, because he wants to make sure beforehand that his journey gets off on the right foot and he is heading in the right direction.
“The building and testing is important, but even more important is understanding the business requirements, and proposing the right solutions,” says Carlos Montemayor, CEO at Inflection Point.
More often than not, developers start building software without trying to understand what their client wants to achieve with their software. “The partner doesn’t just listen to the client and write code; you have to actively listen to business priorities, and then build the right solutions,” says Ramiro Castillo, CTO and VP of Engineering at Inflection Point.
Being open-minded and agile are the core characteristics of good developers. To be effective, a partner has to empower its team members to act as confident contributors, enabling them to speak up and offer creative solutions. “You need to be a team player, and have the soft skills to fit well in our culture, and our client’s culture,” says Montemayor.
Every client looks for a partner who can add value where his company might be lacking internally. After all, this is not just about doing the job, this is about doing it better, says the paper.
A positive cultural environment, finding ways to add value, and providing feedback and suggestions for ideas, can have a transformational effect on the client’s bottom line.
The white paper also makes you aware of upcoming trends in the industry. Soon, there will be two-way engagement between digital assistants and customers, and, in some companies, smart machines will begin to outnumber employees.
To download the white paper and to find out more, click here.