The Value Flywheel Effect: Power the Future and Accelerate Your Organization to the Modern Cloud

“If you wish to survive and thrive in this fourth industrial age, if you wish to understand the landscapes you are competing in, if you wish to understand how modern practices will change your organization, then I would recommend that you read and study this book carefully.” —Simon Wardley, creator of and author of Wardley Maps

“The Value Flywheel Effect is a timely and hugely valuable book providing a set of principles and ways of working to navigate and exploit the fast-changing technology and business landscape." —Matthew Skelton, coauthor of Team Topologies

Achieve rapid acceleration and transformation with the Value Flywheel Effect.

Today, every business is a technology business; every leader is a technology leader. As we enter this new era, organizations must learn to harness technology to drive innovation and power change. In The Value Flywheel Effect, David Anderson, Michael O'Reilly, and Mark McCann enable leaders to create an adaptive organization built upon embracing strategic thinking, team focus, and reduced time to value to drive business results and navigate a migration to the modern cloud.

Using Wardley Mapping and other sense-making approaches, The Value Flywheel Effect helps organizations anticipate market changes and user needs. As the flywheel starts to turn, each small win builds momentum. This continuous momentum builds situational awareness, breaks new boundaries, and catapults companies to sustainable, long-term success.

Learn to understand and utilize the sociotechnical intersection between business, technology, and people with the Value Flywheel Effect. Give your organization the edge it needs to navigate future challenges and build maximum velocity.

“Packed with real-world examples, case studies, and practical tools applied to complex domains, The Flywheel Effect is required reading to plot your future and the business you want to be.” —Barry O'Reilly, author of Unlearn and Lean Enterprise

David Anderson has been at the leading edge of the technology industry for twenty-five years. Starting as a Software Engineer in leading telecom companies (including Three, Nokia, and Ericsson), David moved to Liberty Mutual in 2007 and continued to drive technology change and raise engineering standards. As Director of Technology, David had exposure to a wide range of technologies and techniques covering Architecture, Software Development, Leadership, AI/Analytics, and Cyber-Security. David was involved in the early phases of Public Cloud adoption at Liberty Mutual in 2013 and continued to drive the change. Creating the Serverless-First strategy in 2016, he was able to achieve significant, multi-million-dollar business results, create a new, industry-leading engineering standard within Liberty Mutual and to lead a generation of architects to become cloud leaders in their own right. David is also a member of the Wardley Mapping community and has been involved in many efforts, discussions, and sessions/research groups to further this strategic approach.

In 2021, David parted from Liberty Mutual to explore the serverless first journey across the industry and joined BazaarVoice as Technical Fellow. The Serverless Edge was formed to collate some of this thinking, and he continues to work with clients and partners to prove out the thinking in this book.

Mark McCann is a Cloud Architect and leader focused on enabling organizations and their teams to rapidly deliver business value through well-architected, sustainable, serverless-first solutions. Mark joined Liberty Mutual as a graduate in 2000, enjoying a 21-year career rising to Senior Architect. Mark was heavily involved with Liberty Mutual's journey to the cloud, with a strong focus on adoption of serverless first, the well-architected framework, engineering excellence, and enabling teams to improve their time to value. Mark leverages Wardley Mapping to bring situational awareness to people, teams, and organizations, and to help them evolve and deliver sustainable, long-term value. Mark lives in Belfast, Ireland, writes for the The Serverless Edge, and can be found on Twitter @MarkMcCann and LinkedIn @markedwardmccann.

Michael O'Reilly is a Software-Architect who specializes in arming organizations with the ability to develop ideas into world-class products by leveraging the capabilities of the modern cloud. Since 2005, Michael has devoted his career to enterprise application and service development. He was part of the team that led Liberty Mutual's foray into the world of e-commerce, building out their main online insurance product set. Being a progressive thinker, Michael became an active leader in Liberty Mutual's transition to the cloud. He has become specialized in leading teams and the C-suite into modern cloud product development through sustainable approaches and practices guided by serverless first and the well-architected framework. Michael continues to help organizations embrace the modern cloud as a Software Architect with Globalization Partners and as a contributor with The Serverless Edge.