Two Decades in the Making
After twenty years in and around corporate ecosystems, a biological pattern-recognition machine like myself couldn't help but notice the cycles. Different logos, different industries, same underlying choreography. This letter gathers a few of the most persistent — and, at times, maddening — patterns that seem to resurface in nearly every organization, all in the most courteous language I could muster for those who shephard said patterns.
"This is NOT what I ordered! Who's responsible for this?!? "Well actually, sir.,."
The Catalyst
I’ve been following Eric Kimberling’s content on various platforms for about a year now, and for whatever reason, that particular post finally clicked into place why one can't help but think “This guy just gets it.”
I’ve been writing blog content these last few weeks, so my brain decided to present the expository as a letter to a fictional customer — explaining where their systems procurement approach may be off and suggesting improvements.
Hope you enjoy.
Quest for The Magical Pizza
Dearest Customer (Candidate),
Tech systems aren't discrete bolt ons.
They're designed to become part of and work within your system.
Implemented and maintained to their very best, they’ll perform only as well as your organization does, and this is a coup; your first signpost towards immense improvement and growth, often yielding exponential returns on both CapEx and OpEx.
There are no magical ROI faeries or operational-efficiency incantations, and questing for them almost guarantees the summoning of red-ink daemons — scapegoat-creators and sacrificial-lamb-summoners from new hires to the C-suites. This is the true red ink: not just financial loss but lasting cultural damage.
"I mean, that's kind of a tomato color I guess..." "And it IS circular. That's unquestionably round."
To avoid such deep, long term decimation of your company's potential I would suggest the following:
- SLOW DOWN: In this planning and roadmap phase, you get to choose between the short term red ink of implementation costs which may even include (GASP...) overtime hours over the next few quarters, or departmental, if not global deprecation of workflow efficiencies. The kind that equal performance loss percentages spanning the entire organization for years to come, to say nothing of the "good money after bad" fixes that inevitably come with that. The choice is yours.
- Fire the guy who promised software would improve your quarterly numbers and do your dry cleaning.
- Hire / consult with someone who understands your goals and will tell you when you don’t know what you’re talking about.
- Work with internal and external SMEs to make a plan. Include all relevant stakeholders.
- Remember: neither the business nor the software know each other yet. Construct a core team of humans from each side and keep them shoulder-to-shoulder from initial assessment through final user-acceptance testing, and most importantly, listen to them.
Were your company a performance race car, this implementation would be analogous to upgrading the fuel system: Get it right and you’re seeing checkered flags for years to come. Get it wrong and you’ve downgraded from Formula One to go-kart.
Were your company an investment portfolio, this would be analogous to choosing the flagship stock holding the lion’s share of liquidity and setting performance benchmarks for everything you’ll add afterwards.
Do you really want to approach this investment like you're ordering a pizza? There are plenty of consultants happy to let you — and unless you have that one close professional relationship that keeps your vision in check, and (s)he's knowledgeable in this area specifically, there's nothing’s stopping you. So go ahead if you please, but I can almost guarantee you’ll get Domino’s instead of the juicy operational-efficiency bonus promised in your project proposals.
If on the other hand, you'd like to begin a discussion on how we can collaborate to improve your company's future prospects, our contact information is below.
Sincerely,
The Corporate Refugees Who Couldn't Take It Anymore
Post Script: If you haven't read "The Screwtape Letters" by CS Lewis, follow this link and prepare to enjoy yourself.