Technology Acquisition

Chapter 6

Implementation

Implementation includes all activities required to develop the vendors solution.

Although vendor typically take the lead in managing this process, we need to know about relevant issues surrounding design, development, testing and deployment of solution

People involved in this process are internal implementation team and vendor implementation team

The Implementation ProcessThe implementation process consists of four sub processes; design, development, testing and deployment. It is rare that you will be able to purchase technology and implement it as is. There is typically some customization, integration and data conversion required for the new solution. The changes are defined in Design process. Development includes all work needed to create or build the changes required for the new solutionOnce vendor delivers the solution, it requires a thorough testing; system testing, user testing and potentially pilot testingAfter passing through testing, solution needs to be deployed. Training, deployment and deployment support are discussed in the Deployment section.

DesignChances are that the vendors product will not meet your 100 percent requirements

Normally vendor will agree to customize its product to meet your requirements in order to secure your business.

Once these changes are made the vendor needs to work with you to integrate the solution within your environment and with other systems within your business.

In the implementation phase you need to scrutinize the vendors product and define any gaps between vendors product and your requirements (defined in planning phase)

Once gaps identified you need to determine which ones are critical to your business. Additionally which gaps needs to be resolved immediately and which one can be deferred to a later time (business analysts can help in this)

Its advised to prioritize these requirement gaps so vendor works on important gaps first; for that you might need to define requirements in greater details to vendor for his better understanding

During design process the changes required to close the gaps need to be designed. This design informs developers how to modify solution to close the gaps.

Its a good idea to work with vendor to document the design for architecture, process, data, application and integration component of solution. Technical analysts on your project team and vendors implementation team should know what is needed in order to document the design of solution

DevelopmentThere may be a situation when you find you are tracking multiple gaps with multiple vendors.

Its a good idea to develop a database to help track the changes. The database will help you organize priority, status and ownership of all product change requests that are being managed.

You should know which of your current systems needs to be integrated with the new system because you will have defined the system integration requirements during planning phase.

Actual integration involves developing batch jobs or real time updates between systems.

Regardless of ways of integration, you should plan for this development in advance and be ready to dedicate the resources necessary to properly integrate the new product within your environment.

TestingTesting includes all activities required to verify the quality and capability of solution.

Testing is not much important while buying technology then building technology as Vendors thoroughly test their solution and in most cases product will have been successfully implemented at several other companies beforehand.

In this case your primary goal is to test the components that are unique to your environment

This includes testing the solutions compatibility, customization, interfaces with other systems, performance, user acceptance and results in a pilot test if necessary.

Various types of tests that can be performed includes

System Testing

The process of testing the solution within your environment to verify compatibility, performance, interfaces with other systems and impact to environment. These tests are typically conducted by your internal IT organization and emphasis is on technology and technical architecture not functionality

User TestingThe process of users testing the solution for acceptance of functionality and usability

These tests are conducted by end users of solution and typically facilitated by IT organization.

There are two types of user testing: Vertical testing involves testing of each group of functionality separately whereas horizontal testing involves testing of business processes (also termed as end to end testing)

Get commitment of users to allow the project team to work through any issues that the users identify and not to talk outside the testing team about the solution until the project team has had a fair chance to resolve the issues.

Pilot Testing

Its often a good idea to pilot test a vendors solution before deploying it across the users organization. A pilot test is limited deployment of the solution in a production environment.

This test provides a last chance to ensure that the solution is ready for full deployment.

DeploymentThe deployment process verifies whether you made the right decision in selecting a quality vendor with a quality solution.

Deploying a solution includes training, deployment and deployment support.

Vendors typically offer some form of training. In some cases vendor will handle all training, in other cases a vendor will outsource training to another company that specializes in training. In most of cases vendor will train your trainers and provide training material (manuals, technology based training etc)

After training deployment begins. There are several ways to deploy a system.

If there is an existing system, you may need to run both systems in parallel and slowly transition the users to the new system.

In some cases managing the integrity of data between parallel system is too costly and it make more sense to take every one off the system at one time and bring them all up on the new system at the same time (commonly refereed as cut-over or go-live)

The vendor should have experience in deploying its solution in many different situations and should be able to recommend the approach that is appropriate for your situation. Another important decision prior to deployment is who will support the system. Most companies have an internal support group that is responsible for supporting all information systems. Typically an internal support group will not have the bandwidth to support deployment of a new system. For this reason it is often necessary to create a deployment support team (a temporary team that will assist in supporting the new solution until system is completely deployed and has become stabilized)

THE INTERNAL IMPLEMENTATION TEAM

The internal implementation team is responsible for managing and executing the implementation of the system.

This includes all activities that take place from the time contracts are signed to the time that system is fully operational and support is transitioned to the operations organization.

Internal implementation team typically have following roles

Implementation Project Manager

This individual is responsible for managing the internal implementation team and working with the vendors project manager to coordinate implementation activities.

A project manager manages the whole technology acquisition project from initiation to operations; however in some cases he manages the project up to the point when contracts are signed. He then transitions management of project to a business subject matter expert. The SME coordinated training, deployment and deployment support for the business organization.

Trainers

Trainers are responsible for training the end users. In some organizations there is a training department that handles all training programs, in others some of most experienced end users are assigned to this role (if training department is not available)

The trainers should be positive and optimistic about the new solution.

Technical Analysts

If the new solution require custom development or integration with other systems, there should be technical analysts on the internal implementation team.

They are responsible for designing the custom development and coordinating the development activities with their internal IT departments

Testers

Some organizations assign end users to the internal implementation team as full time resources. Other organizations temporarily pull end users form their jobs to test a particular version of system.

It is important to get a wide variety of end users involved in testing, from novice to experienced end users

Deployment Support

This team consists of business SME who have been on the project team form beginning.

It is important that deployment support people be the most educated about the vendor solution.

Some vendors offer training for these individuals, others have their own personnel join the deployment support team to help educate the team and relate issues back to vendors development organization.

When implementing its important to have several respected individuals championing the cause within their own organization. It is easier for these people to rally support for the new system when they are already respected.

THE VENDOR IMPLEMENTATION TEAMOnce contracts are signed and implementation is scheduled to begin, the vendor will assign a project team whose primary job is to implement the vendor solution.

Team members should be experienced and know exactly what it takes to successfully implement their solution.

It is a good idea to establish good working relationship between your and vendor implementation teams as early as possible to ensure a god transfer of knowledge and teamwork in overcoming obstacles.

The vendors implementation team consists of following roles:

Vendor Project Manager

This senior person is responsible for planning, controlling and executing all activities required to implement the vendors solution.

The project managers is able to steer the project clear of common mistakes and will have a better understanding of when a project is in trouble.

Make sure that vendor project manager has a point of contact in your organization who can help coordinate activities and resources within your organization.

Technical Lead

A technical lead needs to act as liaison between your company and vendors development organization. This person is typically a senior person from the development organization who has a very deep understanding of the technology and how it was developed. Developers

Vendors often assign developers to a project team when a significant amount of custom development is required. These developers will have a wide variety of experience and expertise. It is vendors job to manage these developers and make sure that they are capable of accomplishing the task at hand.

Support Analysts

Vendors typically assign one or more support analysts to act as the liaison between internal support team organization and vendor support organization. The support analysts also play a role in supporting the deployment support team during the deployment of system.

Trainers

Trainer are responsible for either training your end users directly or training your trainers. In either cases these people will be responsible educating your company about the vendors solution.

Its important to ensure that a smooth hand-off takes place from the vendors sales team to the vendors implementation team. The promises made by vendors sales team need to be communicated to implementation team so that it can live up to this promises.

Its a good idea to schedule an implementation kick-off meeting between the acquisition and implementation teams from both vendors and your organization.