The money is in their pocket but we are expected to justify every peny of
it. Thats why our analysts are being asked if incuring $50K is justified
before even placing an order. Talk of being pushed against a rock and a hard
place!
Al

David Gale <[log in to unmask]> wrote in message
news:F4B1826B1A21D211AEC5006008207AF404377515@dogbert.csillc.com...
> Might I ask who's pocket the $50K is coming from?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Al [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Tuesday, January 25, 2000 1:36 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: IT Project Implementation
>
>
> Thanks Everyone for their response. The problem we in the IS are facing is
> that the functional department has selected a package but not ready to
place
> the order yet. The third party vendor has been asked to scope the project
> and submit an implementation plan and the final documentation to us as to
> what the deliverables will be; i.e. a Project Spec. For this we are paying
> them for 5-days consultancy fees. But they have insisted to out user
> department manager that before they can scope the project we must purchase
> all hardware and databases and set the system up so that they can use
their
> generic software to produce the project spec. This is going to cost us
$50K
> to set up before we have put the order to purchase the system. The
business
> manager agrees with the software supplier but our FD has asked us if this
> makes sense and we have said NO. This has put us, the IS, in a situation
> where our experience tells us this doesn't make sense but the user
> department argues otherwise.
> Al
>
>
>
> Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]> wrote in message
> news:F4B1826B1A21D211AEC5006008207AF4043774EE@dogbert.csillc.com...
> > David Gale wrote:
> > >
> > > I think Richard raises a good point. The project is co-founded from
> > > the beginning. A marriage of disciplines, both that of your business
> > > department, and that of the IS department.
> > >
> > > I have seen many projects 'managed' by managing the manager. It
> > > takes the excellent communications skills that Richard suggests. The
> > > point is, who takes ownership of the project?
> >
> > This is all too true.  Third-party packages on a grand scale (ERP, Baan,
> > Peoplesoft, Banner, etc) are most often marketed to non-tech
> > administrators.  The vision is that you buy the software off the
> > shelf, they provide maintenance, you can relocate / reassign / outsource
> > your IT infrastructure.  Save big bucks.
> >
> > They don't mention the administrative overhead, ignore the probable
> > change of platform/DBMS/development tools/utilities, evade the issues
> > which are unique to your business policies that they likely don't
> > support, and other issues.
> >
> > IS/IT/whatever technical people need to be involved to point out issues
> > that may affect your specific infrastructure.  Network demands,
> > client platform and minimum requirements, and multiple points of failure
> > in a multi-tiered client/server environment need to be addressed.
> > Typical management has an ostrich mentality to this, they don't know and
> > don't want to know, so they stick their heads in the sand.  If the
> > project stumbles, in the worst-case scenario the finger is pointed at
> > IS/IT incompetence, or unco-operation, or simple resistance to change.
> > This can bleed down to the functional areas as
> > well.
> >
> > A brand new implementation with no precedent - sure, you have no metric
> > to measure against and blindly follow the vendor like so many lemmings.
> > But replacing an existing system has to have proven advantages that make
> > business sense.  A pretty GUI is worthless if it is unreliable,
> > bug-ridden, inefficient, or doesn't meet your business
> > needs.  Moving to Unix/NT makes no sense for the same reasons plus
> > the additional system administration and software maintenance often
> > required by such systems.
> >
> > In the "old days" IS/IT did tend to dictate business practices based on
> > what they could produce, which admittedly had it's faults.  But
> > currently we face a 180 degree shift where non-technical management
> > is dictating what IS/IT should do.  Neither paradigm works.
> >
> > Hopefully both sides will see the light and we can come up with a
> > solution that satisfies the real business needs for the end-users while
> > remaining a solid, reliable platform that IS/IT can support
> > and enhance to benefit the enterprise.
> >
> > Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>
> >
>