Enterprise mobile applications have a reputation problem. They get built because a business unit asked, they get rolled out because a project closed, and then they sit on a device next to the apps people actually use. At a provincial power utility’s enterprise mobility group, I was product owner for four application initiatives, and the goal was simply to avoid that fate.
A roadmap is a set of promises with dates
All four initiatives shipped within budget and on time, and I give the roadmap most of the credit. It tracked features, user stories, test cases, and the feedback and suggestions that came out of every product demo, in one place, so that a request from a demo in March was visibly either scheduled or declined by April. Nothing kills adoption faster than feedback that disappears.
Put design at the centre, structurally
The change I am proudest of was making user experience design the core of every mobile development rather than a coat of paint at the end. That meant a user-centred design approach with real users from the start: field staff sketching what the first screen should show, office staff explaining which three fields they actually needed out of the thirty the back-end offered.
Utility field work is unforgiving territory for design. Gloves, glare, patchy coverage, a task that must be finished before the truck moves. Every one of those constraints is cheaper to learn in a workshop than in a support queue.
Make it easy to complain
The last piece was a workflow on SharePoint where application users could log issues and provide experience feedback without emailing a developer. It was a plain form. But it was reachable from the app, it acknowledged the submission, and the roadmap showed what happened next. Users who see their complaint become a fix become your best advocates; users who email into silence become your worst.
What carries forward
Very little of this was specific to mobile. A roadmap that keeps its promises, design that starts with the person holding the device, a feedback loop that closes where users can see it. I have carried those three into every product I have owned since, including the ones we build now.