In Outer SaaS no one can hear you scream

In my current IT strategy if an Enterprise Software Vendor doesn't have a "Software as a Service" story then I'm not really interested in what they have to say.

Sometimes you need to be free to make mistakes but traditional monolithic software is not quite the suitable playground in which to make them, mistakes in the enterprise software world are costly.

I once worked for a company that invested in a new Supply Chain Management system only to watch it spectacularly fail and take the jobs of the CIO and IT Director with it, unfortunate for them but fortunately for me, I learnt some exceptionally good lessons at their expense, however they didn't make any particularly bad decisions since they:

• Selected two of the top players in the market place i.e. in the top 5 and to be really specific one of the top 3 hardware vendors and top 5 SCM at that time;
• They were cost conscious and negotiated one of those once in a life time deals;
• They consulted and involved their people, they may not have followed the overall consensus but they involved everyone.

With all this going behind them how could it all have gone so horribly wrong? Well there were a number of reasons but the primary one was "risk", too much risk was involved and it was not suitably mitigated or transferred, and risk is a clear and present danger in the implementation of today's enterprise systems.

There are way too many variables to account for in such complex systems and typically there is too much skin in the game for people to easily pull out when something goes awry.

"The problem with momentum is that it can either take you up a hill or over a cliff, it's agility and responsiveness that can make all the difference in the path that you take"

This is why I like SaaS, you can commit to a monthly fee and use the service tactically until you have a strategic solution and either stick or switch depending on how it works out.

• The implementation risk has been transferred to a 3rd party whose core business and competencies depend upon on them getting it right first time.
• My company gains the ability to do their jobs from anywhere from any internet capable device.
• I have lower requirement for internal systems in terms of lower data, licensing, backup and administrative overhead.
• I have a lower skill requirement internally, I no longer need the all singing, all dancing support person who can roller skate backwards with a kitchen sink tied to his back.

And last but by no means least "Just keeping the lights on" is someone else's job, I get to do the real cool stuff of making it all happen.