Mark Albala witnessed something through a client that helps explain the cloud’s ascent: The client bought a $25,000 product, and got a bill from their technology group of almost $150,000 to install it. The client’s response: “What is this s—-?” They’re now seriously considering SaaS.
He is president of InfoSight Partners. “[SaaS] is not catching on because it’s cheaper. It’s not,” he said. “It’s not catching on because it’s more efficient. It’s not. It’s catching on because companies are tired of dealing with these technology groups.”
SaaS has what many tech groups don’t have: agility. Most large corporations, he says, have embedded, well-defined development processes that take things from conception to production, with lots of people involved for checks and balances.
Sarbanes-Oxley is a big piece of that, he says. It causes rigidity.
It’s all expensive and slow — while business people stand there, hopping with urgency.
Finally out of patience, business runs from IT and into the cloud — where they meet their needs.
But they possibly meet danger, too: multiple stovepipes.
“The understanding of why they shouldn’t establish multiple stovepipes,” he says, “is not going to be there.”
How does a responsible technology group remain responsible to its client and yet support the client? Tech groups can remember, he says, that they have to stay agile.