Trésorier/Treasurer magazine - N°92 - Jan/Fev/Mar 2016 - (Page 65)

The Risk Observatory Solvay BS, ULB Hugues Pirotte From being a niche philosophy, "Agile" became a real success story in the last 10 years. It lingers on the inherent advantages of the process with respect to human behaviour and ability to forecast, and the enormous flexibility/malleability of well architected software (usage of architectural patterns and modern languages), in contrast to the old monolithic way. Unfortunately, unless a clear governance is imposed by the management in that direction, most big firms are centrally conditioned by heavy-planned IT developments. But Agile development without a good understanding of how to conduct it in a big organisation, can also be too disruptive. On the other hand, plan-driven methodologies were rooted in the need to avoid chaotic software development, guarantee the robustness of new releases and of the evolution of IT inside the firm, and thus provide confidence in the control. In that sense, we can characteirse the later as "predictive" in opposition to "adaptive" for Agile development. It is a priori reassuring to believe we can Agile development without "predict development", except that the World outside is all but predica good understanding of table and that reassurance might be how to conduct it in a big naïve. organisation, can also be The solution that many maThe key development at nagers turned to, aside of the the heart of spreadsheets' centralised, heavy-planned IT development, was thereappearance was the fore something light, flexible, algorithm developed in named a "tool" instead of 1970 by Pardo and Landau a system, very visual in its development and capable to do a lot without necessarily programming, namely...spreadsheets. Politically speaking, this is a "no-brainer". No need to start asking for additional resources, justify another system, open a pandora box about the current system, etc... LE MAGAZINE DU TRESORIER / TREASURER MAGAZINE - N°92 - JAN Agile development is not a new notion. It dates back as far as to 1957 with the idea of "incremental software developments methods" and the collection of lightweight development methods that followed through the 80s and 90s. Concretised into an Agile Manifesto in 2001, the 1st and 4th principles are clear: "satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software" and "business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project". / FEB / MAR 2016 From agile development to over-reliance on spreadsheets: another Black Swan? too disruptive. 65

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Trésorier/Treasurer magazine - N°92 - Jan/Fev/Mar 2016

Cover
Table of contents
EDITORIAL
FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS Luxembourg Tax News
INTERVIEW Anni Mykkanen, Policy Advisor EACT
FOCUS
Trésorier d'entreprise : homme- orchestre ou nouveau Business Partner?
IFRS 9: Time to prepare
Uberization' of the economy
What if the new regulations were a new source of risk?
FORUM
Risk and compliance
Is it really your CEO asking for that offshore transfer?
Navigation par gros temps : budgétez vos risques
Commodities hedging
Commodity risk management
Identity and access management
Enabling treasury transformation
CORPORATE FINANCE
Treasury survey: the dynamics of change in treasury
The perfect solution for portfolio management
Meeting market liquidity needs
Automatiser la gestion des comptes bancaires
The age of business simplification is upon us
15 MINUTES WITH Vallstein
THE FINANCIAL RISK OBSERVATORY
NEWS
LIFE BEYOND NUMBERS

Trésorier/Treasurer magazine - N°92 - Jan/Fev/Mar 2016