From the dWb website

Feature Article

When is the right time to change?

Businesses are moving forward all of the time. They have to adapt to the changing environment. They have to evolve to meet the marketplace requirements.

So with all of this change going on, when is the right time to change the IS / IT systems?

How can we recognise when change is needed? Do we have systems that recognise the signs? Do we have the processes and the skills to handle the change when it has been identified?

What are the barriers to change? Can we handle the dichotomy of long-term  economics and short-term flexibility? Do we understand how to handle the business case for perpetual change?

Many manufacturing organisations are building product specific factories that from the beginning they know have a finite life. No longer do they adapt their existing facilities - they have entered the consumerism age - disposable factories. In the IT world this can be done using outsourced services. Rather than adapting the service, let it atrophy and define a new, more appropriate, service.

Feature Article

When is the right time to change?

They say that it is only progress that improves the way we live. We are therefore in a perpetual world of change which supports the phrase - the only constant is change.

So if this is true we should have techniques, methodologies and a culture for change. Interestingly in certain areas of our lives we have embraced change and turned it into a doctrine or philosophy -  "consumerism" - which fuels change. In the consumer world the changes are very dynamic and even fickle, in the corporate world we have a different set of problems. Resistance due to: risk aversion, economies of scale, uncertainty; doubt, lack of perceived need or just plain stupidity.

What is missing is the science of change forecasting. Some changes are imposed: legislation, circumstance, economic, etc., others are far more subtle: taste, fashion, politics, etc. How do we recognise the change and even more importantly, when we have, how do we overcome the corporate resistance to change.

The first challenge is to identify the signs of change (reading the runes). The second is to justify the project to address the "winds of change".

The areas where signs of change can be seen are:

• Market / Marketplace structures. Examples are the change to the travel business that has shifted to independent individual holiday packages and bookselling using internet.
• Transaction volumes. Examples are transaction and associated storage volume changes (both increasing and decreasing) and service centre calls.
• Business. Often caused by acquisitions, mergers, expansion, divestments, legislation or just plain growth (or decline).
• Technology. Examples are "hole in the wall" banking, obsolescence, TCO breakthroughs, wireless networking and mobile computing.
• Tipping points. Examples are e-business acceptance, business process outsourcing, survival (threat of bankruptcy, restructuring) and step change in organisation size (tier change).

 When do you make the change?

The continuous monitoring for signs will provide an early warning system. Linked to a regular strategy review the areas where change is needed can be identified. It is also at the strategy level that the adaptability, flexibility and responsiveness of the IS/IT is formulated. Too much focus on cost and it will be structurally rigid, too much focus on the "ilities" and it will be too costly. It is during this process that outsourcing strategies should be considered for those areas that are subject to regular change. Use the outsourcing not only as a cost containment but as a flexible response to business change.

Now comes the difficult bit.How do you justify the change?

It is important that any change is linked to a business objective. It is also important that the effort of proof is proportionate to the project benefits.

The table below shows the business case assessment criteria and justification focus.