It's Never Too Late . . .

Let’s say a system fix or enhancement is estimated to take from six months to one year to implement (that is, starting from the point in time when resources become available). Or a vendor has agreed to include a fix in some future release.  What’s a nothus miserum to do in the meantime? Muddle through manually? Cobble together some clerical work around?

When a tactical developer implements a solution, it is often with the intention of phasing out the tactical solution when the ‘real’ solution becomes available; that is, when the vendor has finally included the fix or feature, or when the request is eventually plucked from the IT job jar.

As often as not, and certainly too often, the development of the ‘real’ solution never gains legs, or meets with technical or political obstacles, or budget cuts, or shifting priorities, or simply the inability of IT to finish the last ten percent of the project, so that the tactical solution is eventually absorbed into the standard operating practice of the business. Over time, the operating terrain can become littered with tactical solutions, to the dismay of IT management, under whose watch the proliferation proceeded.

But take heart, Mr. CIO, for it’s never too late to assimilate tactical solutions into the mainstream system. Rather than shunning tactical solutions and their developers as the illegal aliens of the business application world, please consider adopting a policy of inclusion by providing them a path to integration.

This path may include refactoring some code, redesigning a few components, or adjusting at a few points of interface. Yet, the tactical developer will have already done the hard parts – working out the fine points of the users’ requirements, articulating the code, and providing you with the perfect model for the ‘real’ solution.  In fact, the hardest part of assimilation may be acknowledging the tactical solution at all (that is, admitting that some of the best ideas come from the field). But after all, savvy managers know that solutions are where you find them.

The benefits of tactical solutions need not be revisited here.  You can simply ask the man who owns one. But the benefits of assimilating them go beyond IT control and standardization.  The user community in general and the tactical developer in particular will exhibit a greater affinity toward the application, having had an active hand in its development and improvement. And, because the problem and its solution are well defined and well understood, the task of assimilation will not require a commitment of your top talent, and may offer the younger or newer developer an opportunity to work with the tactical developer, learn a bit about the business, take a tactical solution off-line and bring a short-term, low risk, high value project to completion.

Good software evolves. And with a little guidance, over time, incongruities can be resolved, standards can be met, and good business solutions can become good IT solutions as well. Sound like a plan?