Editorial
For years, data practitioners, including this author, have worked to engage broader teams with data and AI-based technologies, striving to democratize data use across organizations. Despite our best efforts, success has been fleeting. While leaders have recognized the transformative potential, most have struggled to achieve meaningful adoption at scale.
In parallel, the emergence of citizen engagement is reshaping how many businesses operate. Citizen developers — non-IT professionals leveraging low-code/no-code platforms — are playing a pivotal role in driving innovation.
To be fair, many CIOs have been lukewarm toward this trend, wary of the risks associated with what has been called “shadow IT” or “rogue IT.” The challenge lies in enabling citizen development without undermining governance and security.
The Innovation-Safety Tightrope
Fortunately, the vanguard of CIOs who engage in the #CIOChat community has taken proactive steps to strike a balance.
They’ve embraced the opportunities citizen-based technologies offer while implementing safeguards to minimize its potential downsides. Their approach demonstrates that enabling broader participation in technology development is not only feasible but critical for success in a rapidly changing digital landscape.
Now, a new book by Tom Davenport and Ian Barkin, “All Hands on Tech,” advances this conversation. The authors argue persuasively that citizen development is the way forward for organizations striving to compete in an AI-driven world. By tapping into the creativity and expertise of their entire workforce, businesses can accelerate innovation and better meet the demands of a competitive market.
“All Hands on Tech” is a compelling blueprint for organizations that aspire to unlock the full potential of their people and technology.
Related Article: How GenAI in Low-Code Platforms Can Transform the Enterprise
Citizen Development Is Inevitable
Information technology is nearing its 70-year milestone, but frustration persists in many organizations over traditional IT's ability to deliver solutions quickly enough to meet business needs. Despite advances, the gap between demand and delivery remains a challenge.
Fortunately, new technologies and a more digitally savvy workforce are reshaping this dynamic. As Davenport and Barkin explained, a growing wave of "citizen" roles — citizen developers, citizen data scientists and citizen automators — are stepping in to share the load. These citizens operate outside formal IT departments, using increasingly accessible tools to build applications, automate processes and analyze data.
A critical enabler of this shift is the convergence of more intuitive technology and a workforce that is becoming progressively more technical. Citizen developers leverage low-code/no-code platforms to create applications. Citizen automators use robotic process automation (RPA) to streamline workflows. Citizen data scientists harness sophisticated analytics and machine learning models. These technology-enabled citizens have the potential to be game-changers for organizations looking to move faster and smarter.
Davenport and Barkin emphasized that citizen roles are voluntary, not mandated. These individuals typically hold jobs outside IT and contribute to innovation organically. Smart leaders, they said, recognize the opportunity but also provide guidelines, governance and guardrails to enable citizen initiatives while maintaining security and alignment with organizational goals.
The rise of GenAI has further democratized access to powerful tools, breaking down barriers that once restricted many capabilities to developers, analysts or data engineers. With data proliferating across organizations, large language models (LLMs) now offer practical access to intelligence that data catalogs struggled to deliver. This transformation is helping bridge the divide between technical and non-technical roles, moving us toward what Wayne Erickson called "purple people" — those with blended skills in technology and business.
Davenport and Barkin argued that digital transformation has taken too long, largely due to reliance on traditional approaches that required large teams of experts to code and implement solutions. To accelerate progress, digitization must become everyone’s job. Organizations that embrace this shift will outpace their competitors, achieving greater agility and less friction in their transformation efforts.
The Beginnings of a Citizen-Led Revolution
Davenport and Barkin connected citizen-led thinking to the open-source movement. Open-source software democratized technology creation and fostered a culture of collaboration, which helped IT professionals become more comfortable with the idea of citizen development.
This gradual but significant shift reflects a broader cultural change in organizations. As Davenport and Barkin noted, the journey to citizen empowerment will differ for every organization, often progressing through stages: initial experimentation, followed by automation and culminating in analytics and data science.
When citizens venture into data science, Davenport and Barkin wisely advised partnering with qualified data scientists. Such collaboration ensures that analytical approaches are rigorous and aligned with best practices. While having a background in math or computing is helpful for citizen data scientists, the most critical skills are an understanding of the business problem, empathy for those seeking solutions and the ability to integrate insights into operational processes effectively.
Ultimately, citizen-led initiatives succeed when they are rooted in collaboration and shared purpose. By empowering employees to innovate while fostering strong partnerships and thoughtful governance, organizations can unlock new levels of agility and insight. This isn’t just about tools — it’s about enabling people to connect expertise, creativity and empathy in solving real business challenges.
The Benefits of Citizen Development
Citizen development transforms how organizations approach problem-solving, innovation and decision-making. By empowering employees outside traditional IT roles to build applications, automate workflows and analyze data, organizations unlock a wealth of benefits that fuel competitiveness in a fast-moving digital world.
One of the most immediate advantages is better decision-making. When more employees have access to tools that enable data-driven insights, organizations benefit from a democratization of knowledge. Employees can address challenges in real time, leading to informed and confident decisions that align with strategic goals.
Citizen development fosters a culture of experimentation and innovation. By lowering the technical barriers to creating solutions, employees can test ideas, iterate quickly and experiment without lengthy approval cycles or deep technical expertise. This unleashes creative problem-solving, allowing organizations to uncover new opportunities and refine existing processes.
Another key advantage is faster digital innovation. Traditional IT development cycles were lengthy and resource intensive. With citizen developers using low-code/no-code platforms, digital solutions can be created and deployed rapidly, meeting business needs in weeks instead of months. This enables organizations to adapt quickly to market changes and stay ahead of competitors.
Finally, citizen development leads to better processes for doing business. Employees who work closest to business problems are best equipped to identify inefficiencies and design tailored solutions. Whether automating workflows, optimizing customer experiences or improving back-office operations, citizen-led innovations drive operational excellence. By empowering citizen developers, organizations not only enhance agility and innovation but also create a more engaged and collaborative workforce. In this way, citizen development is not just a technical trend — it’s a strategic advantage in the digital age.
Related Article: Moving From Low Code to No Code With GenAI
The Rise of Citizen Development
Low-code/no-code platforms have revolutionized software creation, driving the rise of citizen development. By 2025, 750 million applications will be needed to meet demand, and 80% of tech products may come from outside traditional IT teams. These platforms bridge the gap between costly custom builds and generic off-the-shelf solutions, enabling faster, cost-effective deployment tailored to business needs.
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Collaboration between IT and business remains vital. IT oversight ensures citizen-developed apps meet quality, security and organizational standards, reducing shadow IT risks. GenAI amplifies this trend by enabling applications to be built from natural language prompts, making software development accessible to all.
To balance speed and governance, hybrid development models are key. Business teams can create user-facing elements while IT refines back-end systems. This approach combines agility with oversight, leveraging emerging technologies to drive innovation securely. With strong collaboration and governance, citizen development can meet the growing demands of a digital-first world.
The Rise of Citizen Automation
Citizen automation empowers employees to digitize manual tasks and streamline workflows, enhancing efficiency and decision-making through tools like robotic process automation. By automating repetitive processes, it reduces inefficiencies and accelerates operations across the enterprise — from back-office administration to front-office sales and marketing, and middle-office transaction management.
Effective citizen automators are business team members who deeply understand processes and enjoy solving problems. Their curiosity drives them to create prototypes that often serve as minimum viable products for broader innovation. The benefits are significant: faster operations, improved accuracy, greater employee satisfaction and cross-departmental collaboration.
However, challenges exist. Automating flawed processes, or "paving cow paths," perpetuates inefficiencies. Additionally, citizen-led projects can introduce technical debt through inexperience with software best practices, potentially creating security risks or inefficiencies. To succeed, organizations must pair citizen efforts with IT oversight to ensure solutions are secure, scalable and sustainable. Citizen automation should go beyond task digitization — it should empower employees to drive meaningful change. By fostering collaboration and addressing pitfalls, a more agile and innovative enterprise can be built.
The Rise of Citizen Data Science
Citizen data science can be divided into two distinct categories of activity, each representing a critical portion of democratizing data-driven decision-making within organizations.
The first category involves straightforward data analysis, focusing on descriptive analytics, visualizations and basic techniques like linear regression. Often rooted in traditional business intelligence (BI), this category emphasizes exploring central tendencies, correlations and simple regressions. The ethos here is self-service, empowering employees across functions to analyze data independently.
However, realizing this vision requires effort. Davenport and Barkin shared research from Accenture that reveals only 25% of employees feel fully prepared to use data effectively, and just 37% say they trust their decisions more when they are based on data. Alarmingly, 48% still rely on gut feelings for decisions, and 74% report feeling overwhelmed or unhappy when working with data.
Addressing these gaps demands a focus on data literacy and education while making it easier for employees to access and use relevant data. Tools like data catalogs, data marketplaces and generative AI aim to simplify the process and lower the barrier to entry for non-technical users.
The second category represents true citizen data science — employees engage in more complex analyses and build sophisticated predictive models. They are comfortable with automated machine learning platforms and generative AI models, allowing them to tackle many tasks traditionally performed by data scientists. Often, they have a mathematical or technical background and some familiarity with programming. Examples include geophysical engineers, chemists or insurance underwriters, whose domain expertise allows them to explore advanced analytical approaches effectively.
These kinds of citizen data scientists are well-suited for problems involving supervised learning models, machine learning and generative AI analyses. While they don’t replace professional data scientists, they augment their organization’s analytical capabilities and broaden the range of problems that can be solved.
The key to unlocking the potential of citizen data science involves providing the right tools, training and support. Straightforward analyses require expanding access to BI tools and fostering a culture of self-service analytics. More advanced citizen data scientists should receive opportunities to learn data science methods, enabling them to evolve into even more technical roles over time. By fostering both categories of citizen data science, organizations can empower employees to make better decisions, solve complex problems and drive innovation — all while cultivating a culture where data truly informs and accelerates business success.
Related Article: Cultivating a Culture of Innovation in the GenAI Era
The Skills and Personalities Empowered Citizens Possess
As AI advances, fears of job displacement persist. However, workers embracing roles as citizen developers, automators or data scientists are future-proofing their careers by acquiring critical digital skills. These individuals stand out with a unique blend of qualities and expertise that enable them to thrive in a rapidly evolving landscape.
At their core, successful citizens are passionate and entrepreneurial. They embrace innovation, take calculated risks and remain curious and eager to learn. This mindset drives them to explore new tools, techniques and opportunities. With perseverance and grit, they overcome challenges, turning setbacks into valuable learning experiences.
Creativity and innovation set them apart, enabling them to think outside the box and design impactful solutions. Beyond personality traits, Davenport and Barkin argue effective citizens build essential skills. Deep domain expertise helps them understand and solve business problems, while data, analytics and digital literacy empower them to leverage the technologies driving citizen development, automation and data science. Depending on their role, technical skills such as programming, low-code/no-code development or working with machine learning models may also be crucial.
Equally important are human relationship skills. Citizens collaborate across teams, build trust with stakeholders, and communicate effectively, bridging the gap between technology and business. A hallmark of their success is a computational mindset — thinking logically, breaking problems into manageable parts and approaching challenges methodically.
By combining passion, creativity and technical acumen, citizens become indispensable to their organizations. In an era of rapid technological change, those who cultivate these traits and skills will not only adapt but excel, driving innovation and securing a fulfilling future.
Citizen Development Sets Sail Toward Innovation
Citizen development, like other transformative initiatives, has a maturity model.
According to Davenport and Barkin, the journey begins with Random Acts of Citizenry, where individuals experiment without structure or support. From here, organizations progress through stages of Awareness, Acceptance and Forced Exploration and eventually to Formal Acceptance. The pinnacle stage, Industrialization and Absorption, reflect a seamless integration of citizen development into the organizational fabric.
Success in this journey requires the engagement across the organization — citizens, champions, coaches and stakeholders. Together, they build a collaborative ecosystem that supports the growth and sustainability of citizen development. The authors emphasized the importance of starting with a clear destination in mind, establishing robust governance and guardrails, and guidance to ensure projects align with strategic goals.
Governance plays a crucial role, particularly in highly regulated industries. These firms need data stewardship and structured oversight. They need to strike a balance between mitigating risk and enabling innovation. This balance can be achieved through a combination of community-building, centers of excellence and centralized repositories for citizen-developed technologies, all while maintaining alignment with IT governance frameworks.
Davenport and Barkin see an evolving role for IT professionals. Rather than gatekeeping technology, IT teams become coaches and assessors, fostering collaboration within fusion teams that combine technical expertise with business insights. This shift allows IT to provide oversight while empowering citizens to innovate responsibly.
Without question, citizen development requires careful navigation to unlock its potential. By following a clear maturity model and balancing governance with empowerment, organizations can harness creativity and ingenuity of their teams while minimizing risks — setting sail toward a more agile and innovative future.
The Need for Citizen Development in an AI-Driven World
Citizen development can reshape the way organizations approach innovation and problem-solving, as employees outside traditional IT roles leverage low-code/no-code platforms, automation tools and AI technologies to create solutions faster. However, democratizing these capabilities requires more than just enthusiasm — it demands careful governance, structured support and a clear vision.
Davenport and Barkin made a compelling case for citizen development as a transformative force, outlining a maturity model that starts with experimentation and culminates in seamless integration across the enterprise. By balancing governance with empowerment, organizations can tap into the creativity of their entire workforce, enabling the rapid innovation needed to compete in today’s marketplace.
Ultimately, citizen development should be more than a trend — it should be a blueprint for thriving in an AI-driven world.
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