Thoughts for Odoo Partners #7 - Should you hire BAs or developers?
Welcome to the seventh edition of The Launch Pad - Thoughts for Odoo Partners.
TLDR; In today's edition
What is this?
Each week I will share a thought, an insight, or a tool that has helped me, another Odoo Partner or a client. Standing on the shoulders of giants, and learning from those before us is the shortcut to growth I wish for all of us.
Each edition will be short and quick to read.
Thought of the week
Should you hire Business analysts or Developers?
When we started using Odoo 10 years ago as an Odoo Partner it was the wild west.
Odoo was relatively uncommon in Australia, there weren't many partners. Odoo had many use cases that had to be customised to meet (now they are in standard Odoo ??)
You could get away with anything, and win any project, it truly was the wild-west being an Odoo partner 10 years ago.
To win projects today you need to be excellent, have a marketing strategy, experience, references and a solid sales pipeline.
We hired developers
Odoo needed more customisation than it does now to meet customer expectations 10 years ago.
We would customise Odoo to make it a perfect fit for the business.
Without customisations, many customers would not have enough system coverage to make the project the success that they wanted. From customer deposit flows, stock routing and valuation, Odoo has come a long way!
A lot has changed in the last 10 years
Odoo Today - The present and future
Today you need less and less customisation, and more and more is out of the box and configuration.
领英推荐
We are now seeing Odoo partners hiring more BAs and fewer developers.
Business analysts can even use Odoo Studio to do a few extra things for a project or scope out anything needed as a late or second stage of the project for a developer to code.
An Odoo Partner will need both devs and BAs, but the balance has shifted over the years.
Odoo partners that have been around for a long time may need to adjust hiring and consider a BA-first approach. Newer Odoo Partners may need to consider the role of devs to expand into larger projects.
Who do you hire? What role is most important at your Odoo Partnership?
Keeping up
Will it ever stop?
Every day there is something new... technology, AI advances, political change, and the cost of living crisis.
Countless businesses are pivoting to the "AI Space" in a race to bring AI into their industry before their competitors do.
Then you hear about the fatigue from clients being pitched countless AI products they don't need.
The question is are you pushing the latest hype, or are you shining a light on what your clients desperately need?
Our effort should be on solving our client's problems and bringing them value, and not being distracted with the "latest" (unless of course that is the answer, which it only sometimes is).
Why do you need AI? Because it's.. "AI". Isn't the answer your clients want to hear.
What have you seen been pushed as the latest, greatest, but isn't what the client needed?
Stay focused on giving your clients solutions and value.
Happy Odoo'ing
Chris White
OLaunch
Apasionado del Open Source y Odoo | Gestor de Equipos | Experto en Comunicación y Relaciones Interpersonales | Comprometido con el Aprendizaje y la Innovación
3 周In my experience, successful ERP implementations require more than just a developer or a business analyst. A strong team with expertise in training, consultancy, and technical customizations is essential. Some projects need deep technical knowledge, while others rely on process optimization. Keep up these nice posts, Chris White
Executive High-Growth ?? Tech | Strategy, Data Driven approach,Global Service Operations, IT & Finance Systems | Scaling Global Teams & Transforming Business with Proven Strategies.
1 个月Chris, this is a fantastic breakdown of the evolving dynamics in the Odoo ecosystem! Your point on BAs vs. Developers is spot on. A decade ago, deep customization was essential, but today, with Odoo’s maturity, the balance has shifted—BAs now play a bigger role in maximizing out-of-the-box features before resorting to code. The smartest Odoo Partners today rethink hiring: ? BAs bridge business needs with Odoo’s native capabilities, reducing unnecessary development. ? Developers remain key but focus on high-value customizations, not reinventing the wheel. This shift makes BA-first hiring more viable for smaller projects, while developer-heavy teams thrive in complex implementations. Success lies in balancing both. Also, your take on AI hype is refreshing—clients don’t need AI for AI’s sake. The best Odoo projects still focus on solving real business problems, not trends. Curious—how are other partners adapting to this shift? ??
Transforming Businesses Through Integrated Digital Systems | Digital Transformation & ERP Implementation Expert
1 个月BA definitely. The focus should be on using the native functionality as much as possible and only developing when absolutely needed. Further, I would like to see Studio only available in staging environment and odoo build a machanism for pushing proven sound modifications to production.
I equip your team with the tools, strategies, and confidence they need to excel in sales and marketing—turning them into a growth engine for your business.
1 个月Definitely BAs, with a good product intuition and enough technical knowledge to leverage AI-assisted coding.
BA's with a good technical feeling