Your Platform-as-a-Service Racing Form

Well, not really, but Charles has next best thing: a strong post Handicapping PaaS.  If you’re into noodling about the future of the on-demand “great game,” it is worth a close read. 
Go to the comments as well, some good back-and-forth as well as my take (comment five).

SAP ERP Upgrade Surge

Eric Samuels at the SAP Watch blog has an interview with Steve Strout, the new ASUG CEO (here).  This post focuses on the recent surge in upgrades in process or completed (the SAP press release is here).  A couple of key quotes:
First, it’s an extremely stable release. People are able to do a technical upgrade without [...]

Enterprise SW value, complexity, and R&D

Dennis Howlett’s extended response (here) to Vinnie Mirchandani’s post demanding more simplicity — or begging Steve Jobs to find it — in enterprise apps (here).  Dennis effectively boils down Vinnie’s argument to this:
Why is it that despite all the interest in SaaS and Enterprise 2.0 that the industry offers so very little apparent bang per [...]

Are PMs finally paying more attention to outcomes?

Interesting study reported by siliconrepublic.com (here) on the relative importance of project success measures among the Irish project management community
The most important measure[s] of success among the respondent project managers [were] to achieve organisational objectives (70pc)… and matching stakeholder expectations key for 63pc.
Being on time and on budget were only rated about half as highly, which [...]

Reducing SAP implementation time/cost

A case study (here) and press release (here) about a quick, clean SAP Business All-In-One implementation at TomoTherapy.  What stands out about what worked?

Using SAP Best Practices as the baseline.  It makes it very easy when one can leverage a fully documented and functional prototype.
Using a partner willing to leverage SAP Best Practices.  It is instructive [...]

Why aren’t trainers better paid?

Demir at the SAP blog at techtarget.com (here) wonders whether trainer pay should be higher (here).  I think he has the importance of training and development, but I’m not sure that higher comp is coming any time soon.   Comments on his post (some edits for space) below:
SAP trainers don’t make as much money as implementation [...]

Legal vetting helps reduce project failure

Interesting SearchCIO article on leveraging legal (and purchasing) expertise to faciliate deals (here, I think this is available w/out the free registration).  A few comments on the speech by Erik Phelps:
“It is not just the ‘bad vendor’ who sells the software; often it is the bad customer who isn’t going about the procurement process very well,” [...]

On Demand/SaaS and New Year’s

New Year’s always brings back memories of applying the old “LCPs” (Legal Change Packages) to R/3. LCPs are required to ensure HR systems reflect the latest legislation or administrative rulings for the various jurisdictions that the HR system covered. Not exactly a value-added activity, as needed as it was.
This type of content update is exactly [...]

Pareto, Saas, and the “Real World” (Part 1)

All ERP customers lament the size and complexity of their implementations.  My experience has been that they just don’t get what they’re trying to do — create a real-time model of their businesses.  Most IT folks have been used to only automating bits and pieces, without looking at how they optimized the whole.
The seduction of [...]