Will the real No-code tools please stand up?
What no-code design actually is and how it can transform your business
What is “No-code” actually?
It might be the hottest new buzzword for tech companies, but really, it’s not that deep. No-code is a principle for user interface design that allows the user to “modify” code without explicitly writing code, without requiring high technical ability, and without necessarily realizing that’s what they’re doing.
We all interact with no-code experiences every day. Your iPhone settings, for example — through just a few simple toggles, you can change how your iPhone displays notifications, what voice Siri has, and more. From the user side it seems as simple as pressing a button, but actually that button press activates more complex functions within.
But not all no-code tools are created equal. The mark of great no-code design is:
1) Simplicity — The user should feel like the product is elementary (my dear Watson), even though complicated things are happening behind the scenes.
2) Intuitiveness — The user does not need to think very hard to use the product, they can rely on muscle memory (or “minimal cognitive effort” as Nobel–winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman puts it).
Overall, in a well designed no-code tool, the user only has to understand which few buttons to click, and are not burdened with more complicated details and processes. If you’re doing no-code design right, the user shouldn’t even notice your hard work (#unappreciated 🥲).
The No-code Hype
No-code design has been a growing trend for the past 5 years, but was truly buffeted by the labor market conditions following the COVID-19 pandemic. In the age of digital transformation, enterprise IT organizations are expected to rapidly adapt legacy architecture for new technologies to deliver high quality end-user experiences, all while maintaining enterprise security and keeping their infrastructure lean. Trying to achieve this vision with custom code is costly, time-consuming, and damn near impossible without attracting (and retaining) the right talent.
Talent, especially technical talent, is expensive and hard to come by. This is where no-code comes in; by reducing the expertise required, no-code tools help companies transform their business with their existing manpower.
The Difference Between Low-code and No-code
In theory, low-code is defined as tools aimed for technical users, while no-code tools are for the business user. In practice, it’s more of a spectrum. During my own tenure at Appian, a low-code app development platform, I designed features that skewed towards no-code.
The struggle for product managers at any low/no-code company is to balance ease-of-use with power. If you lean too far towards simplicity, you may end up with a pure no-code tool that can’t actually do much. And if it is power that you seek, you risk going down a slippery slope of complexity. The key to navigating this tightrope is to focus on your users.
The Citizen Developer
Just as no-code and low-code tools exist on a spectrum of ease-of-use and power, their potential users range in technical ability and business knowledge. The popular term for these users is “citizen developer”. A citizen developer is someone in a non-coding role who creates new applications, workflows, or solutions within the enterprise IT. The way they do that without being a software engineer is — you guessed it — by using low/no-code tools. For example, a Marketing Manager can configure an automated welcome email in Mailchimp whenever a new client is added in Hubspot with just a few clicks.
But it’s not enough for a low/no-code provider to say that their software is for empowering the citizen developer. Frankly, that’s kind of a cop-out. At best, the term citizen developer is overused and sidesteps the responsibility of defining the target user. At worst, it’s a deliberate attempt to obfuscate a steep learning curve *cough Salesforce cough*.
When evaluating technical ability of users, keep in mind it’s not just about whether they can write code — also consider how comfortable they are with concepts from programming (variables, logic statements) and software architecture (databases, APIs). And depending on their role, users may also have varying levels of business knowledge, their understanding of the enterprise’s functions, roles, data and processes.
So let’s instead consider these different user personas of the citizen developer:
- Novice User — A non-technical role requiring low business-specific knowledge; ex. HR representative processing documents for new employee onboarding.
- Business User — A somewhat technical role requiring moderate business-specific knowledge; ex. Banking operations associate executing transactions for the trading desk.
- Technologist — A highly technical role (but not software development) that requires strong business knowledge; ex. Healthcare researcher evaluating clinical trial results.
Bringing No-Code Design to Resultid
TL;DR: “No-code” is the new “synergy”. It’s the latest overused hype-word, used by companies to convey that users can do XYZ functions without needing to know how to code. But no-code is actually a design philosophy (not always practiced by the preachers). And just as low/no-code are nebulous to define, the industry lumps all types of users under a blanket term called “citizen developers”, and in so doing often fails to make products tailored realistically to their skillsets.
The REAL no-code tools will:
- Follow no-code design principles of simplicity and intuitiveness
- Define and build for a specific persona of “citizen developer”
Like most Medium articles, insights are easier to write about than to action. The Product team at Resultid, led by yours truly, is applying no-code design to demystify and democratize AI/ML for the business user. Our mission is to help you find and tell the stories hidden in your qualitative data — and my personal mission is to take the suck out of your work. I have an exciting roadmap of Narratives coming through the end of summer (ex. launched Sentiment Analysis) so stay tuned. Please sign up for our Beta and send me your feedback!
