Post on 01-Jan-2016
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Slide 1Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Adapting Model Driven Solutioning (MDS)to Customer Requirements
Michael GuttmanMichael GuttmanMontages Technology PartnerMontages Technology PartnerCEO, The Voyant Group, LLC (USA)CEO, The Voyant Group, LLC (USA)
Slide 2Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Adapting MDS to Customer Requirements
Searching for the ‘Holy Grail’ The Importance of ‘Solutioning’ Model Driven Solutioning (MDS) Early Applications of MDS Recent Applications of MDS at Montages Future Directions for MDS
Slide 3Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
The Holy Grail of Business
1. Business conditions change
2. Business correctly identifies new needs and opportunities
3. Business precisely specifies new solutions
4. Business efficiently acquires, implements and deploys those solutions
5. Business reaps associated rewards
6. Go to 1
Slide 4Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
The Holy Grail Sounds Simple Enough, But….
The business does not describe its needs and opportunities in a consistent way
Different groups (e.g. Business Units and IT) speak very different ‘solutioning’ languages
Nobody follows efficient or consistent processes for creating, acquiring, integrating and customizing solutions
Solutioning projects are ‘balkanized’ into functional – and non-functional - silos
Existing silos and layers of legacy organizations, processes, software, hardware and ‘muddleware’ compound all of the above
Slide 5Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Meanwhile….
Spectacular project failures are becoming more common. Frequent less spectacular failures, delays, and cost overruns
are leading to increasing business dissatisfaction, especially with IT
Systems and data maintenance and integration activities dominate business and IT budgets and human resources; little bandwidth remains for new initiatives
Promising approaches like BPM and SOA are increasingly harder to integrate into legacy organizations, processes, and infrastructure
All the above results in increasing burnout and fatalism that undermine creativity, productivity and loyalty
Slide 6Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Where Have We Gone Wrong?
Not for lack of trying – but with too many poorly-planned, uncoordinated initiatives
BPM, SOA, 6-Sigma, Agile, Outsourcing… Focus on tools and technology,
rather than process, organization and content Increasing emphasis on cutting costs, rather than
improving overall performance Project-centric – rather than program-centric –
planning, budgeting and governance Lack of a truly ‘holistic’ and
incremental approach that covers all solutioning activities
Slide 7Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Does This ‘Solutioning Process’ Look Familiar?
And at least this process is well-documented!
Slide 8Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Can We Get Back To The Right Path?
Maybe – no guarantees No one tool, process, software package, vendor or
approach can provide everything Legacy is ‘here to stay’ - no new approach can
ignore existing systems, tools, processes or organization structures
To be successful, any new approach will need to adapt to the legacy environment, and then be further iteratively customizable over time as conditions change
Successfully adopting and adapting new approaches over time requires integrating them into an overall ‘solutioning process’ that is very flexible.
Slide 9Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
What is ‘Solutioning’?
‘Solutioning’ is the overall process by which an enterprise creates and evolves solutions to perceived problems or opportunities.
‘Solutioning’ includes (but is not limited to): Problem identification Problem analysis Solution definition Solution program/project organization and management Solution acquisition, implementation and integration Solution deployment, maintenance and evolution Budgeting, funding, and administration of all the above
Slide 10Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Why is ‘Solutioning’ So Important?
No matter what an enterprise thinks it does (e.g., ‘manufacture shoes’), ‘solutioning’ is what it really does!
That’s because an organization can only survive and prosper if its solutioning process is at least sufficient to respond to changing business conditions.
Organizations with the most effective and timely solutioning processes gain market advantage over time by responding better/faster to new opportunities/challenges.
Therefore, progressively improving the solutioning process can be ultimately more valuable than solving any particular business problems or improving any particular business processes.
Slide 11Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Isn’t ‘Solutioning’ Just Another Form of ‘Business Process Management’ (BPM)?
Yes – and no… ‘Solutioning’ is the overall process of identifying and solving
problems’, as such, it is a key (maybe ‘the’ key) business process for managing all other business processes.
However, traditional BPM is focused on domain-specific business activities, e.g. “placing an order”.
Also, traditional BPM is usually not concerned with other parts of the solutioning process (e.g. implementation/maintenance of solutions).
Therefore, traditional BPM may be viewed as one possible tool/method within an overall solutioning approach.
However, as we shall see, BPM can be used to help model and improve the overall solutioning process itself ….
Slide 12Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Why Model the Solutioning Process?
It is generally accepted that modeling traditional line-of-business processes (e.g. ‘order entry’) typically results in improved process performance and reduced costs
However, ‘solutioning’ is really the most fundamental process in any business, and ultimately impacts the performance of all line-of-business processes
Therefore, applying modeling to the ‘solutioning process’ first should yield the highest long-term ROI by improving the rate at which all other processes improve
This is even more true because the solutioning process at most enterprises is currently poorly understood and woefully inefficient
Slide 13Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Modeling the Solutioning Process – An Example
Slide 14Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
What is ‘Model Driven Solutioning’ (MDS)?
MDS is an approach to continuously improve the overall solutioning process by progressively documenting and optimizing that process using formal modeling techniques.
MDS adapts to the existing solutioning process – it does not attempt to change it directly. MDS works even if – and especially if – most or all constituent parts of the solutioning process are sub-optimal.
MDS does not dictate any particular implementation of itself; that is, MDS can easily present itself to each solutioning participant using the solutioning approaches, tools, techniques, and processes most familiar to that participant.
Slide 15Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS and Model Driven Architecture (MDA)
MDS is a specific application of Model Driven Architecture (MDA) to the problem of solutioning. It should not be confused with other applications of MDA (e.g. code generation from models).
MDS uses MDA-related modeling patterns to integrate otherwise disparate solutioning approaches, techniques and tools into an overall solutioning model.
Like MDA, MDS is modeling-language-agnostic – that is, almost any modeling approach, language, or tool can be integrated into MDS, and/or used to model MDS itself.
Slide 16Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS - High Level, Top-Down, MDA-Style Viewpoint
Solutioning Architect
Solutioning Process Designer
Solutioning Program Mgr.
SolutioningSpecification
Models
SolutioningImplementation
and Deployment
Solutioning BusinessModels
SolutioningDesign Models
Solutioning Project Mgr.
Computationally Independent Model (CIM)
Platform Independent Model (PIM)
Platform Specific Model (PSM)
Slide 17Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Example – State of Wisconsin (1)
Improve IT RFP Process for State Welfare Agency The problem:
Existing solutioning process dictated outsourcing of all IT projects Typical outsourcing cycle was 3-5 years! Resulting solutions were hard to maintain, evolve, or integrate.
Contributing factors Requirements gathering process was slow and error-prone Generating IT specifications was slow and error-prone Generating RFP documents was slow and error-prone Evaluating RFP responses was long and complicated Business requirements changed frequently during RFP
development and response analysis process, requiring massive rework
Slide 18Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Example – State of Wisconsin (2)
The solutioning approach: Develop high-level business model (CIM) of solutioning process; gain
consensus from all major stakeholders. Streamline the requirements gathering process by introducing business
domain modeling tools and techniques to business analysts Automatically generate all required RFP artifacts from business models Require RFP respondents to indicate differences between their
proposed solutions and elements of the RFP business models The results:
Dramatic improvements in requirements gathering speed and quality Requirements changes quickly accommodated up through RFP issue
date Mapping business requirements to IT specifications was standardized Time/effort required to generate formal RFP documents totally
eliminated Overall RFP process reduced from 3 years to 3 months! Resulting solutions are much easier to maintain, evolve and integrate
Slide 19Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Example - State of Wisconsin (3)
Solutioning Architect
Solutioning Process Designer
Solutioning Program Mgr.
SolutioningSpecification
Models
SolutioningImplementation
and Deployment
Solutioning BusinessModels
SolutioningDesign Models
Solutioning Project Mgr.
Model Overall Solutioning Process
Introduce Business Modeling
Specify RFP Auto-Generation
Slide 20Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Large CH Bank (1)
Improve Documentation for Global Data Warehouse The problem:
Difficult to track warehouse data supplied by regional systems back to relevant business decisions
Expensive, time-consuming, error-prone process to assess/predict the impact of regional system changes to warehouse data
Resulting errors could potentially cause serious problems in data quality, integrity, and availability to client applications
Contributing factors Overall solutioning process did not include documentation change
management Scarce centralized resources tied up in document management
and analysis for regional systems
Slide 21Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Large CH Bank (2)
The solutioning approach: Develop high-level business model (CIM) of required documentation
process, integrated into overall solutioning process; gain consensus from all major stakeholders
Develop formal document repository model; implement repository Reverse-engineer desired documentation metadata from existing
artifacts Develop forward-engineering documentation change management
process; integrate into existing solutioning process. The results:
Implementation artifacts now clearly tied back to relevant business decisions
Dramatic improvements in documentation availability and relevance Documentation change management simplified Change management responsibility can be distributed to regions,
freeing scarce resources Resulting solutioning models can be reused in other projects/programs
Slide 22Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Large CH Bank (3)
Solutioning Architect
Solutioning Process Designer
Solutioning Program Mgr.
SolutioningSpecification
Models
SolutioningImplementation
and Deployment
Solutioning BusinessModels
SolutioningDesign Models
Solutioning Project Mgr.
Model Overall Solutioning Process
Integrate Document Mgmt into Solutioning Process
Specify Document Mgmt.Repository Model and Process
Slide 23Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – UML Conceptual Model (1)
Slide 24Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Current Excel View (2)
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MDS – Montage Example – BPMN View (3)
Slide 26Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Jaree – Small Start-Up (1)
Improve Marketing Performance Management (MPM) The problem:
Many firms have no process to manage performance of their marketing activities; Jaree has developed a proprietary MPM process
In order to grow, Jaree needs to progressively automate its entire sales, marketing, and delivery process, ultimately productizing its offering
Automating piecemeal will take too long, cost too much, and leave Jaree with point solutions difficult to evolve and integrate; also, Jaree solutions must integrate easily with legacy systems/process of all future customers
Contributing factors As a startup, Jaree’s business model is evolving rapidly, and it needs its
solutioning process to adapt accordingly Traditional approaches to business modeling and software development do
not take into account Jaree’s unique solutioning needs as a startup As a start-up, Jaree is resource-constrained in money, people, and time.
Slide 27Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Jaree – Small Start-Up (2)
The solutioning approach: Develop lightweight, agile approach to modeling and prototyping
using off-the-shelf (OTS), open source (OS) tools and techniques Develop high-level model of Jaree solutioning process and MPM
domain Prototype representative solutions to test models. Progressively adapt models and prototypes to business evolution Evolve prototypes into interim solutions as feasible; delay fixed
implementation decisions as long as possible The (early) results:
Improved understanding of solutioning model and MPM model leading to significant rethinking of Jaree business plan
New revenue opportunities have been uncovered and related dependencies identified
Original software implementation plan being radically restructured, resulting in the freeing of scarce resources freed for more strategic activities
Slide 28Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
MDS – Montage Example – Jaree – Small Start-Up (3)
Solutioning Architect
Solutioning Process Designer
Solutioning Program Mgr.
SolutioningSpecification
Models
SolutioningImplementation
and Deployment
Solutioning BusinessModels
SolutioningDesign Models
Solutioning Project Mgr.
Model Overall Solutioning Process
Integrate Model-Driven Rapid Prototyping Techniques
Specify Model-DrivenSoftware Development Processes
Slide 29Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Adapting MDS – Some Conclusions
MDS can be introduced into any part of the solutioning process at any time; it is easy to introduce because it readily adapts itself to the ‘host environment’ – existing people, tools, processes - rather than demanding the host environment change to accommodate MDS
MDS ‘forces’ alignment, consistency, and accountability, but without compelling any particular changes in existing solutioning or business processes or practices
MDS delivers the most ‘bang for the buck’ of any modeling approach; introducing MDS first makes it much easier and more cost-effective to introduce other kinds of modeling in specific solutioning activities.
Slide 30Portions copyright The Voyant Group 2006-7
Questions?