Use Case Corner
For a major provider of professional services, a “make or buy” component plan was devised. This provider had already developed many of the basic systems needed to conduct business or in some cases, had purchased and installed the appropriate systems. They had payroll systems and major systems for setting up a client engagement, tracking expenses, and billing customers for invoices.
What was missing was an integrated set of productivity systems to be used by the professional in the field, delivering services. Indeed, they had many productivity systems, but they had been built on different platforms by different vendors over the years, resulting in nonintegrated systems that couldn't play together.
It was determined that all field productivity systems would be built under one umbrella that specified architecture and would be delivered via one employee portal, using a Web services approach.
The following steps describe how the vendor research was set up, organized and vendor selection was accomplished:
Step One
First, identify the required services by business area. Then, prioritize according to the selected criteria. Plot the services against the criteria, resulting in the service prioritization matrix shown in Figure 16.5.
Figure 16.5. This service prioritization matrix helps a major professional services firm prioritize the services required, and supports make or buy planning.
Step Two
Next, plot the services against the current state, determining whether adequate systems exist within the company, to what extent they meet the needs, and whether outsourcing or vendor selection is a possibility.
Figure 16.6 shows the resulting matrix of services against technical factors.
Figure 16.6. Technical prioritization matrix shows how existing systems meet the needs of business areas and plots the technical factors against each required service.
Step Three
Next, for the services that are identified as buy options, vendors are identified and a vendor SWOT matrix is developed for each of the identified services or for a bundle of services. As shown in Figure 16.7, the vendor SWOT shows a summary of vendor research at a glance.
Figure 16.7. The Vendor SWOT matrix shows how vendors stack up against the competition.
Based on the deliverables from these three steps, the requirements are clarified, technical options are identified, and desirable vendors are identified and researched to determine where to purchase the required services.