Down in the trenches, business analysts are the ones tasked with developing business cases for IT application development. And, in the process, smoothing relations among competing parties and moving projects along.
Read the whole ““Why Business Analysts Are So Important for IT and CIOs” article in CIO.com
Sandra Noble
NOBLE FINANCES
NOBLE & ASSOCIATES CONSULTING, INC
I was perusing BPM Strategies magazine and came across the term “applistructure “. Applistructure has to do with the convention of combining enterprise infrastructure and enterprise business applications. Service-oriented architecture (SOA) refers to a web centric / web focused approach to technology. According to the “SOA and Application Infrastructure” article by Mike Rosen, this applistructure trend was hot a couple of years ago. Can you relax? Or, as Mr. Rosen suggests, can you take comfort in knowing that solving management and business process issues are more critical to enterprise success than the actual technology?
I attended the Atlanta AFCEA (Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association) February 2008 meeting. The speaker, Mr. Joe Capps talked about the subject of moving to enterprise level systems and procurement processes. Instead of haphazardly developing technology in an “after the fact” manner, he advocated a more proactive approach – as in developing a strategy to move toward enterprise infrastructure, enterprise business applications and enterprise technology in general.
Additionally, a key imperative of the Department of Defense (DoD) is to change and accelerate the requirement to solution process. What’s known as Moore’s Law (based on Gordon Moore’s predictions about semiconductors), says that technology is rapidly changing. Probably about every 18 months. Where there is a need for the latest technology, Moore’s Law has financial, logistical and feasibility implications. The government and the DoD are known for red tape and cumbersome processes. But our country’s ability to respond to immediate threats requires current, accurate information delivered to those needing it in a timely fashion. He suggested the criticality of providing our war fighters with decision making data on how to even respond to five guys running down a street in Iraq. Wow!
Moore’s Law has implications in the private sector as well. Large scale technology projects often take 18 months or more to implement. That time is in addition to the time required to budget for, select and procure the software, hardware, and implementation partners. While ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), CRM (Customer Relationship Management), MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) and the like, may not be obsolete, there are sure to be upgrades, patches (corrections and fixes to software problems) and new feature by the time the system is finally rolled out.
So, what can be done? Knowledgeable consultants with system expertise can help companies and public sector entities develop a strategy and select the right software in the first place. Then, the right implementation partners can accelerate and provide Independent Verification and Validations (IV&V), project management and governance throughout the implementation process. If none of these things were in place or addressed during the course of the technology project, then you’ll probably need the cure for the “Post Implementation Distress” that is sure to occur.
You’re spending millions of dollars for enterprise initiatives. Wouldn’t it be worth spending a small percentage on ensuring that you get what you paid for? Perhaps you need a technical advocate to help you navigate through the planning and implementation process.
Sandra Noble
NOBLE FINANCES
NOBLE & ASSOCIATES CONSULTING, INC
GOD, grant me the Serenity
to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
and Wisdom to know the difference.
The Serenity Prayer
In software and technology implementation projects, there needs to be something called “Change Control”. And why is this needed? No matter how thorough the business analysis job or how complete the project plan, there’s always something that needs to be changed or added after the fact. Users and potential users of the system or technology change their minds. Or think of something that they absolutely cannot live without. Then from the technical side, the developers, programmers and implementers discover things that are incorrect or just won’t work. Programmers or testers find things called “bugs” – which is techie talk for errors or system glitches. After all, that’s what quality, quality control and testing is supposed to do – Find things that will cause less than desired results.
Testing and quality is key. And it needs to start at the beginning. Once the technology requirements are finalized, you have the basis for test scripts that can be used throughout the implementation process. There will be change. So, there needs to be an orderly process for incorporating changes and corrections / fixes.
One reason is that it helps insure that everyone on the project is in sync. It avoids duplication of effort. And, it’s less disruptive when there are multiple environments (development / test versus live / production) or multiple release versions. It’s an essential piece of the communications plan. Change control is a recipe for success. And, back to the Serenity Prayer: the introduction of new systems, features or functionality is something that can be controlled. And the smart project manager has the courage to mandate a change control process.
What we cannot change is people and how they react to change. Change, even positive change, creates stress – another thing we can’t change. What we can control is the implementation and use of programs and techniques that ease the pain and stress of change. And that’s called Change Management.
Sandra Noble
NOBLE FINANCES
NOBLE & ASSOCIATES CONSULTING, INC