Why Software Research Labs Fail?
Research labs are a significant investment by enterprises to delight existing customers, shape the future and unlock new growth streams. Yet, research labs have a short shelf life within software focussed enterprises. Research labs may get closed due to macro factors such as the enterprise not doing well financially or a change in the organization’s goals. Let us look at some of the reasons that prevent research labs from contributing to the enterprise’s business bottom line, which often leads to the lab closure:
a) Lack of supply lines to convert a research idea into an industry-grade solution: An army at war needs a supply line to provide rations, equipment, and replacements. Similarly, to take a software product or solution to market, we need a supply line of a) engineering teams to covert proof of concepts created by the research team into an industry-grade Minimal Viable Product (MVP), b) operations team to deploy and support the product and c) sales, and marketing teams to sell the product. The lack of this supply line is often a key reason why ideas from research labs fail to take off.
b) Setting Incorrect Objectives and Key Results (OKRs): This is another interesting key reason research labs fail to deliver for their organization. To attract and retain research talent coming fresh out of colleges, research labs tend to set publications in top-tier publications as one of their goals. Unfortunately, these publications value hair-splitting optimizations of algorithms that may find use in minimal practical scenarios above practical applications. So while research organizations can boast of outstanding publication records, this mainly translates into nothing for the enterprise.
c) Inability to form valuable business partnerships: Research labs can use business units to resolve the supply line problem. Delivery-focused business units have their targets and roadmaps to execute, planned for months in advance. They cannot foresee how they can use the capability of the research labs. Research labs may find it challenging to contribute to the day-to-day functioning of business units to gain their trust and support. The lack of these alliances further drives research labs away from the real problems that the organization is facing.
d) Leveraging the Community: Research labs do an excellent job collaborating with other research labs and academia. They used to fail to show the same understanding in cooperating with potential stakeholders from inside and outside the enterprise. I see that research labs are rectifying this by releasing code that allows incorporation of their research into other’s work. Sharing enables the testing of the research work, and the collaborating minds can find further applications for the study.
I hope you find these reasons meaningful. Please do add in comments other reasons which in your opinion lead to failure of software labs.
