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Mastermind Keynote: The Powerful Cocktail of Real-Time Enterprise Monday, 4 November 2002 Everything in the world is speeding up. And many people often think of screaming “Stop the world. I want to get off.” Quoting the title of the 1960s Broadway musical, Gartner vice president, Steve Prentice, introduced a Mastermind Keynote presentation at Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2002 in Cannes, France, on Monday by saying that surely no one thought things might slow down. Then Andy Kyte, another Gartner vice president, demanded to know “Why not? Whose foot is on the accelerator?” Answering his own question, Kyte said it is we ourselves who are driving the need for speed. We demand instant service and direct our purchases to vendors that recognize our importance. We have choice and can take our business elsewhere. Thus, “It is the free, unfettered choice in the market,” he said, “that creates the need for speed.” Once we understand that, Kyte continued, we can turn it around and realize the implications for us as suppliers of goods and services. We have to positively embrace the need for speed, accepting the challenge of saying, “We will be competitive, we will survive.” To do that requires accepting the idea of the Real-Time Enterprise, according to Gene Phifer, Gartner vice president and research director. Phifer admitted to having been skeptical of the concept at first, but in going through the definition, he noted that there was no mention of technology. “It leads with the business and business processes,” he said, and follows with the technologies. Also, he was pleased that it embraced the managerial processes “that we have overlooked so far.” Before, Phifer said, we looked at system integration. Now we are taking a wholistic approach - people and processes as well as system integration. “In the old days, we were focused on cost reduction. Now we are focused on elapsed-time reduction.” The Gartner cyclones model will help enterprises achieve the focus to select and simplify key processes. Then, Phifer continued, the imperatives are to “slash waste and stabilize the organization and set goals.” One of the major challenges in this work process will be to overcome the mistrust that many business executives now have for IT. Gartner vice president Betsy Burton said it was no surprise that businesses will happily commit to an investment in a factory with a ten-year payback but be reluctant to back a three-year payback for IT investment. “We have to explain the value of IT,” she said. The trouble is that the business value of IT is moving into softer areas. It used to be about saving costs through automation. Now it is about enhancing potential value through enabling. Not all IT projects are equally important and managers need to understand the business values of their portfolios of applications so that they can manage the portfolios according to business principles, adjusting the portfolios’ balance according to circumstance. Managers will need to be able to understand how to measure the business value of IT and ensure that there are mechanisms to capture that value. Most important, they will have to demonstrate the business value. Achieving value and accelerating key processes requires solid foundations. Nick Jones, a Gartner research fellow, said an enterprise architecture would be essential. This is a family of rules, patterns and templates, he pointed out, and not a straight-jacket. Managers should think in terms of the framework set by town planners, which specify where the roads and utilities will go and how they should be joined up. But town planners are, within limits, not too concerned about the particular designs of individual buildings. Jones warned that enterprises cannot just go out and buy an architecture. They will have to build their own. And that will include setting out the rules of corporate governance. An architecture, Jones said, is not about technology; it is about culture. Summarizing the presentation, Steve Prentice said enterprises will be starting on a new journey. All three issues are interlocked and need to be addressed. “The Real-Time Enterprise,” he said, “is not an option. Nor is an enterprise architecture. Nor is delivering and demonstrating the business value of IT. You have to be doing them all at the same time.” Prentice predicted that “We’ve hit a point when economic conditions have created a powerful cocktail for time-based change that will wipe out waste and inefficiencies.” Jonathan Green-Armytage Gartner Staff |
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