Use Tactical Urgency to Introduce New Technologies

Recently Kelly Emo, SOA Product Marketing Manager at HP Software wrote in her post "Is your SOA in Action? Four ways to keep it that way.." One element she offers in her Obvious Insite # 3 is to use your SOA governance to drive adoption of new technologies such as RIA and Cloud Computing.

Much of my work over the last decade in getting new technologies adopted by enterprise IT has been under the proverbial banner of "Herding Cats". I have learned is that it is very hard to introduce new technology as part of the strategic plan and that SOA governance is often more of a roadblock than a driver.

Technologies that help integrate data between silos require the endorsement of too many chiefs and even with executive stakeholder support strategic efforts can fail under the urgency of immediate problems. In my experience with technology adoption of RIAs and EBSs from both the vendor and purchaser point of view I have found that even with a strong business imperative the inevitable urgency of tactical requirements derails the best strategic plans.

A better approach is to use a tactical urgency to demonstrate a real benefit. In this way it is possible to establish a beach head through a small project that demonstrates a believable ROI. From there you can position the technology successfully in the broader strategy.