Innovation in Implementation Series

Innovation in Implementation series

Agile working is about eliminating the barriers to getting work done efficiently, with the greatest flexibility and fewest constraints.

Agile has been around for a long time but, when applied in practice to an enterprise systems implementation project, is easy to get wrong. In the Innovation in Implementation series, various individuals from Alfa draw on their talent and experience to discuss how you can work in an agile fashion to deliver quick and often.

The latest paper in the series, #5 Establishing Winning Frameworks and Teams, is out now.

One of the most important factors in a successful technology transformation is the people. That's not just about attracting and retaining talent, but spans a wide range of factors - including how to build strong teams, how to ensure clear and effective communication, and how to overcome challenge and adversity.

Establishing Winning Frameworks and Teams draws upon Alfa's collective knowledge to provide insight into how to coalesce strong, motivated teams with the latest innovations, to deliver successful change with reduced risk. It explores the role of leadership and governance, how to establish the right project resources and communication between them, and the qualities that partners should bring to the table.

The use of public cloud infrastructure, increasingly ubiquitous across enterprises and industries, is a prime example of external expertise that can simplify and accelerate the build and roll-out of various capabilities, reducing risk and freeing up internal talent to focus on higher-value effort that delivers a competitive advantage.

In Cloud Services: Finding Success with SaaS, we discuss the different deployment models available, the factors technology teams should consider when making deployment decisions, and the consequent evolution of cloud deployment models. We also uncover the impact of cloud deployments on agile delivery of complex enterprise systems transformation projects.

Modernising your core platform can disrupt point-to-point integrations, which may have been developed over many years. It follows that their reimplementation, with all functionality retained or improved upon, is a key project challenge.

Furthermore, formulating the new ecosystem to allow for future integrations enables businesses not only to continue working with the tools that have become critical to their operations, but also lays the groundwork for future growth and expansion.

Integration - Leveraging the power of an open platform discusses the prioritisation of features and portfolios, aligning the various teams, understanding the data, and designing integrations that are easy to build, change and maintain.

Data migration is often thought of as the most challenging aspect of an implementation project.

This usually takes the form of either migrating existing portfolios from legacy applications as part of a system implementation, or onboarding newly acquired portfolios to an established production system. Common to both is the need for data to be migrated in an effective and efficient manner, with a pragmatically balanced data selection crucial to successful delivery.

In Onboarding Portfolios Efficiently and Effectively, we explore how agile techniques can minimise risk when manipulating large volumes of sensitive data. We also discuss how cross-functional teams, empowered to drive pragmatic scoping decisions, can accelerate the delivery of business value and provide robust support for future onboarding.

Historically, systems replacement projects have focused on large ‘big-bang’ milestone deliverables that transform complex systems landscapes overnight. Such projects often span multiple products or countries, build in a large number of integrations, and refresh all of the operational procedures - all as part of one single, giant effort.

In Derisking Your Systems Replacement Project through Phased Implementation, we discuss how the lessons learned from the industry, alongside the rise of agile methodologies, have prompted alternative, phased implementation approaches which present an exciting opportunity for companies to move away from the traditional models that bring a high level of risk, complexity and cost.