Dovetail Software Blogs: Executive Tools, Including This Blog
“The
great task is (1) to integrate all the tools across all the layers; (2)
to convert into tool-governed processes those procedures that remain
ungoverned; and (3) to distil real-time intelligence into actionable
views of the entire state of the enterprise for executive leadership.
The last part will be the hardest.
“With all the software
tools and formal practices at work within the enterprise, why is it
still such a tricky business to run it right? Why do management teams
fail to take the correct action – what is the tool that is still
missing?”
Decision-Making
“Tom
Davenport and Jeanne Harris were talking about their research project,
“Managing Business Processes Analytically”. Tom shared results of
research he and Jeanne have done on automated analysis and
decision-making. One of the primary ways to leverage analytics in
business processes is to embed analytical decisions into the process
flow itself.
“Sometimes the right approach is partial
automation of a decision to support someone but, regardless, you need
to treat decisions as a corporate asset and plan the use of decision
technology to act as a platform for bringing analytics into processes.”
BI: core to the enterprise
”’The
evolution of BI will continue to be driven by the business need to
incorporate BI-style analytics directly into business process
management,’ Schlegel said at the conference, which was held March 12
to 14.
”’By 2015,’ he predicted, ‘BI practices,
methodologies and technologies will have become recognized as core and
integral components within 80 percent of enterprise applications.
Organizations must find a balance between empowering humans to make the
right decisions and bolstering their processes with basic, quantifiable
optimization techniques.’”
Hiring talented tech workers: Easier said than done
”’The
quest for talent means that nothing you’ve done in the past will
suffice,’ says Morello, speaking at the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo.
“To
navigate those changes, Morello noted that companies have to ask
whether they have the talent to move ahead, and must realize that job
descriptions may not reflect the talent of the staff. Companies also
need to figure out their tendencies. Is the company ruled by policies?
Or is it aggressive?”
Gartner: Wake up IT managers, you’re mediocre (at best)
“India
has the IT mojo and U.S. could get lapped even though economic data
seems to support growth. ‘IT is a declining or stagnant market,’ says
Prentice.
“Wanted: Innovation. As technology managers hang
back for the next software upgrade, their bosses (CEOs) are going to be
looking for innovation. The concern: If CIOs don’t deliver CEOs will
bypass them.”
Outsourcing, Part 2: Uncovering the Hidden Costs
“Security
risks, higher-than-expected costs and productivity losses—as well as
management, communications and coordination problems—have led some
outsourcers to reconsider their decisions and even pull some processes
back in-house. Moreover, as the outsourcing market matures, cost
inflation has pushed executives to take a harder look at outsourcing,
offshoring and near-shoring.”
Google Apps customers await email migration tool
“Barlow
would like to decommission her old system. She’s waiting for Google’s
email migration tool so she can migrate stored mail in her old system
to Gmail. ‘Google is going to provide the tool and we’re hoping to get
it this quarter,’ says Barlow.
“Once her old system is decommissioned she estimates Arizona State will save about $450,000 a year.”
Speeding the Arrival of the Integrated Enterprise
“By
now, it would seem the lesson is clear. Application integration is a
job for software companies—aka ISVs (independent software vendors)—not
end customers. The good news is that the ISVs are finally doing
something about it, leading to two completely different approaches to
the problem, each with its own set of pros and cons.”
