Day 22: Plan the next upgrade

Posted on 22 August 2009
Tags: 31 Days, Implementation, Improvements, Upgrade

I have been involved in a lot of selection and implementation projects of Integrated Workplace Management Systems. Implementation in particular is a very delicate and thorough process. Every new release your IWMS is becoming more adapted to market requirements. Some organizations have migrated from major release to major release for more than 15 years now.

To me implementation has always been extremely rewarding in terms of personal and customer fulfillment. Implementation of new software ensures that your IWMS continues to play a significant role within your organization. But this is exactly where IWMS goes wrong.

You want to benefit from the new release however, IT is blocking that particular release for no obvious reason.

I have witnessed this problem so many times and I understand that you need to convince IT to implement a new release of the IWMS. Therefore, today’s teaching and task is about your IT department and your planning to upgrade your IWMS.

Today’s Teaching

IT is a different type of ball game. You probably recognize this; whatever you try to accomplish both from a business as well as from an organizational perspective is being questioned by IT.

They seem to have no flexibility at all besides their own games and consoles. Unfortunately IT has a powerful voice within your organization and unless you totally want to frustrate your project, you need to cope with IT people in a sensible way.

Exactly for that reason I have written this post. IT staff has a manual. And if you want to be successful in your IWMS project you’d better know that manual inside out.

IT plays an important role in every organization but most importantly in knowledge organizations. These organizations are exactly the same as the organizations that use IWMS; knowledge workers with a lot of human capital. If you want to have an IT upgrade but you are not sure what to do, here are a few guidelines:

Business Case

Your human capital is working with IWMS’s to either improve efficiency or to reduce costs. This however is in most cases not clear to IT departments. They see IWMS as another application that requires resources to manage it. And therefore your task is to familiarize your IT staff with your business case.

If you want IT on your side you need to discuss the business case with them. (or at least with their management). What is the gain of the organization in implementing a new version of the IWMS? It needs to be clear that IT can play a significant role in this process otherwise IT will not acknowledge benefits for them.

Dedicated Staff

Only organizations that have dedicated IT Staff for the Integrated Workplace Management System will be able to migrate successfully from one IWMS version to another. If you don’t have a dedicated IT person responsible for your IWMS project, you will most likely encounter upgrade / update problems.

Knowlegde

In a lot of cases I have encountered IT Staff with sufficient knowledge of IT systems however, not of Integrated Workplace Management Systems. Besides being dedicated your IT Staff needs to be aware of the business impact of an IWMS. The more they are aware of this business impact, the more likely they are to support your upgrade.

Importance

IT Staff needs to be important. Being the systems technical administrators they do have an important role in your project. If you want them to support your upgrade, they need to be acknowledged as important.

Acceptance testing

Most IWMS professionals forget that your IT Staff is responsible for technical maintenance of all systems including your IWMS. This is a significant responsibility and as a result IT staff tends to minimize their risk as much as they can.

In most cases Enterprise Systems such as IWMS’s have acceptance testing as a part of their upgrade routine. If you want IT supporting an upgrade, you need to ensure that they can count on a thorough acceptance testing program.

Planning

Every upgrade needs to be planned carefully. Resources need to be allocated, and responsibilities need to clear to all stakeholders. As upgrading is a careful project, so is the planning. If you want your IT staff to support your upgrade you need to plan in advance so the dedicated staff can free their calendars.