The Yin Is Here. The Yang Is Up In The Air

Nicholas Carr makes an important point about claims made by software vendors in ensuring business success for their customers.I am surprised that in claims/projections from product companies in general, the value derived through consulting is seldom highlighted. At one level, it may be difficult but not impossible to correlate in exact terms the relationship between IT investments and business success. From a consulting perspective, success/failure would be measured in terms of both output and input value. Output value is measured by how much more business value enterprises can get for intended expenditure. Input value comes from how much enterprises can do the same with IT for less. Consulting /services bridges the gap between vision & reality. Product companies provide a platform with a plethora of choices and combinations. In the recent past the message from most of them used to be - The best of the best practices are embedded inside as repositories. Uncork the genie – road to prosperity is crystal clear. Conceptualizing innovative models and rolling out cost competitive solutions are amongst other things the key elements of success besides organizational readiness & support. It is indeed the truth that top line standard products may not hinder trying out different/multiple models. From an age of fitting oneself to a readyware size, we have transited to an era of virtually unlimited options and means to try almost infinite levels of innovation. That means all the more reason to factor in the role of services bridging the gap – we see that enterprises of late spend lot more time in assessing service provider/consulting firm fitments related to product assessments. It is like discussing about the yin without the yang in place. On top of it any value derived is contextual. Emphasising richness,adaptability, versatility are one thing, but success doesn’t in general flow just along with a dimension and so claims that overlook these – would anyway look incredible. Read this as a post aimed in general about the practices followed in the software industry.