Thursday, October 20, 2011

APM - is liposuction enough? How about addressing the cause

I am continually staggered by organizations who are happy to identify the need for reducing the complexity of their portfolios e.g. application, technology, service, information, etc. and happy to commission consultants to come in and help them do this e.g. APM without ever stopping to consider and address the issues that cause the bloat in the first place.

It seems to me it is like a fat person, recognizing they are fat, and seeking Liposuction - to suck out the unwanted fat. Without recognizing what causes the unwanted fat and address that at source (e.g. changing their diet, changing their exercise patterns etc.).

Now if I was a liposuction sales person (or a APM consultancy) then perhaps it doesn't make sense for me to point out the client that the problem could actually be solved at root cause?

If one did want to solve at cause one would want to look at how the initiatives (projects) that create the excess (i.e. duplicates and overlaps of: application function, technology, service, information, etc.) are managed and seek to address those.

Of course this would result in a substantial reduction in consumption of IT technologies and services - so would be opposed by a number of powerful forces i.e. almost the entire vendor community (the fast food franchises); the consultancies (cosmetic surgery and weight loss fraternity); the local IT organization fearing a reduction in their size/spend.

I am also kind of tired of hearing people say the problems can't be solved. To me this is just arrant nonesense.

The solutions lie in:

Understanding some of the systemic problems e.g.
- http://ict-tech-and-industry.blogspot.com/2008/08/limitations-of-documents-and-why.html
- http://ict-tech-and-industry.blogspot.com/2008/08/projects-are-artifical-constructs.html
- http://ict-tech-and-industry.blogspot.com/2008/06/why-organisations-struggle-with.html

Looking at some solutions:
- http://enterprisesto.blogspot.com/2011/10/strategic-requirements-management.html
- http://enterprisesto.blogspot.com/2011/04/business-transformation-management.html

Having the will to change
- http://ict-tech-and-industry.blogspot.com/2009/03/to-fat-to-diet-to-unfit-to-exercise.html

Understanding the forces and vested interests that oppose change.





No comments: