Build, buy and decision automation - James Taylor's Decision Management

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November 13, 2006
Build, buy and decision automation

I saw this Build v Buy Workbook over on IT Toolbox (written by Craig Borysowich). I liked the basic approach here although I do think that a Service Oriented Approach allows for build v buy or both and that the future is in a composite approach to assembling applications (See Gartner's approach to the future of application development for example). If you take the approach that each service component can be bought or built then you might use the workbook a little differently. Some specific comments:

Having a competitive advantage
I don't think that competitive advantage comes from applications as a whole. Many times most of an application is just backbone stuff that offers no competitive edge but some part of it might well do. For instance, a call center application might not offer much differentiation but the ability to do cross-sell well in that context might well do. Hence the service focus rather than the application focus.
Ownership/control of source code
Although this is one aspect of "ownership" I would add "Ownership/control of business logic". Often the use of a business rules management system allows a company to own the business logic that will drive the behavior of a system and this can avoid the need to own the source code of a process or data collection applicaiton. I control the decisions in my systems not by controlling the code but by controlling the business rules. Focusing on the various ways to automate decisions (7 ways to build decision services) is one way to do this.
Retaining current procedures and processes
Even if retaining current procedures are important, I would want to track future needs to change the procedures. I might want to retain them but make it easier to change them in the future.
Reducing maintenance
A core benefit of a business rules approach is to drive down the cost of maintenance over time by empowering the business users to control some of the logic.

I also think that the 5% of a business that is unique is decisioning and that most of the top 10 excuses for not doing this are easy to refute.

Technorati Tags: BRE, BRMS, business agility, business rule, business rules, composite application, decision automation, EDM, Enterprise Decision Management, legacy modernization, service, SOA

Posted by jtaylor in Business Agility • Business Rules • Decision Technologies • Legacy Modernization • SOA |Digg This|Add to del.icio.us

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Comments

Very true. Many IT apps are just General Purpose Technology, and might not really add to a company's competitiveness.
Businesses should focus on results, and a Service Focus agrees with that idea.

Talking of maintenance, I can think up of some more benefits arising out of the Business Rules approach.
1. Empower Business Users & reduce maintenance(from this Blog)
2. Reduce employee training time(The system makes intelligent Decisions). How about Zero !
3. Reduce Manager time spent on supervision.(The System is Right. Employees cannot make mistakes)
4. Reduce mistakes arising out of human error to near Zero

Posted by: Rajgo at November 14, 2006 04:20 AM

Thanks for the links James!
I agree with all of your views on making the decision and the need to know what level of granularity an organization needs to go from a component perspective on enterprise solutions to know that they are buying/building the right pieces.

The key with any process and even using my workbook is that a decision gets made on going one way or the other. Too often organizations don't know even the basics of evaluating alternatives and end up in analysis paralysis. This becomes even tougher when the marketplace is only creating more alternatives every week.

Posted by: Craig Borysowich at November 16, 2006 10:51 AM