Terminology has consequences ...

I always thought that pilots, not the flying kind, were a good thing as they give our clients and prospects an opporutnity to try before they buy, BUT, does it then stop a project from going any further because it has an end point? Does that make sense?

Typically a pilot will be a 30-60 day project where someone can try a piece of software and prove a business case by applying a process, or something that's trying to be achieved, and proving the outcome. But then when that's been accomplished, typically an organisation will stop what they were doing and go back to the drawing board, with no sense of continuation in mind.

My thoughts are that a pilot is purely phase 1 of the bigger picture and that phases 2 onwards should already be planned and prepared, ready to go if, or when, phase 1 (the pilot) is a success. Everything in business and technology happens so fast these days so if you're looking at a project enough to commence a pilot it's because you already have serious desires to roll this out in the very near future. So why would you stall your imporant project by not being ready to go with phase 2 when phase 1 (the pilot) is complete.

It's also very important to not get into the habit of running numerous pilots to prove the same thing. A pilot (phase 1) is more than capable of proving your business case so there isn't a need to continue with another, and then another. If this is the case then I suspect that there is another reason why you can't push ahead with your project, afterall, how many successful pilots will convince you to go ahead?

In summary, I definitely agree that phase 1 (the pilot) of any project can be the 'proving phase' and therefore should still be on offer to all of our clients, but let's help each and every one of them be prepared to move ahead with phase 2 when the desired outcome has been reached. The end point of the bigger picture is where these organisations need to get to so helping them with that journey is what we do best.