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Unless someone is very good at many different IT areas—development, management, content, design—that person is part of a team. And technology teams, especially those that use agile methodology to build apps, need to consider data visibility as a way to organize the final product.

So, if you don’t clearly understand the role of this capability in your project, it’s best to take a step back and understand how your team can benefit from it.

What is data visibility?

Data, as everyone who works with Information Technology already knows, is dynamic. In projects based on agile methodology it can change at any time to improve the next phase of the project. That’s why monitoring it is, more than something that facilitates the process, an obligation for the team.

Data visibility, then, is nothing more than organizing data in a way that allows all team members—including those who are not in technical areas but contribute to the project on other fronts—to understand it and access it without difficulty.

That way, if a change needs to be made at any time, on any side, everyone involved in that demand will know exactly what it is—and if it compromises the work of any stage or team, data visibility allows people to perceive that in real time.

Why is it so important?

In general terms, knowing exactly how project information stands is extremely important so it can be done within deadlines, without interruptions or ruptures, and delivered with quality.

When we talk about developing an app, that is even more urgent. After all, building apps is not cheap: it involves many teams and necessarily assumes a return on investment.

When the task is part of a process based on agile methodology (as with most app development), it’s necessary for data to be tracked by everyone involved because each person’s action generates a reaction or response based on the data being worked.

That means it’s impossible to complete a task and hand it off without analyzing previous data and planning future data.

And, obviously, it’s hard to achieve any of these objectives if you don’t have access to all information globally about the app you’re building—or, in other words, if you don’t have data visibility.

“So this tool should be used to centralize communication between developers and designers?” Also. But it doesn’t stop there: the project manager must have data visibility to know whether deadlines are being met or whether the project has bottlenecks. The marketing team should be able to see information to know when the sales team can enter the scene. Content creators should know at which stage, and in which format, they can include their work inside this gear—and so on.

How do I implement data visibility in my app?

The best way to start making your data visible to the whole team is by structuring the project within agile methodology, so that each part of the whole clearly understands its responsibilities and which information it needs in order to move forward.

But if you still don’t know whether it’s better to adopt a fixed or open scope to maximize the cost-benefit of your app, it’s better to take a step back and hire a software factory to handle this.

Software factories can not only help you segment tasks so an app can be built, but also work on data visibility in a clear, objective way aligned with the type of methodology you choose to adopt.

That way, no one is left out of the project and, with a team focused on the essential information, the final result can be even better than expected.

Need help with your app, your development methodology or your data visibility? Talk to X-Apps!