Your Own Tech Can Eat You For Lunch

Tech Acquisition - The Carnivorous Carnival of Uncertainty

Ever find yourself knee-deep in a project armed with nothing but your boundless enthusiasm and a vague notion of what’s going to be required? Ah, the blissful ignorance of a journey embarked upon without a roadmap! Into the uncharted realms where delightful projects morph into budget-sucking spectacles that take more time than a snail's commute. And let's not forget that worrying side-eye from our colleagues and overseers – the quiet (for now) critics of our ambitious endeavors.?

But wait, there's a contender for the silver medal of project misfortune – the “paralysis of analysis”. Those grand plans that never see the light of day, entangled in the web of overthinking. Perhaps overthinking is the Yin (white, light) to underthinking’s Yang (black, dark). Remember too that Yin contains a bit of Yang and vice versa.? All one way or the other tends toward failure. It is finding a healthy mix that is the challenge! But also the reward.

Today, we set our sights on the tech realm, where projects often teeter on the brink between glory and chaos, all within the confines of an organizational setting.?

Now, before we dive into the tech abyss, let's establish a fundamental truth – technology is a capricious beast. It's like a pet tiger; both thrilling and potentially deadly if not handled with care. To truly extract value, tech must waltz harmoniously with your organizational strategy, serving every nook and cranny of the org. Sounds like a plan, right? Well, brace yourself! This plan demands more appetite for “strategic buffets” than many tech evaluators possess. We're talking about an all-you-can-think-and-investigate feast: exhaustive discussion, documentation, validation, and testing. It's a smorgasbord of cognitive delights, and a potential career springboard (or suicide) for those in an org. with an appetite risk for reward who are ready to teach the tiger to balance on a beach ball. Let’s remember though that your tech evaluation team is juggling multiple full-time endeavors outside this project.

The Tech Odyssey - Parables of Dashcam Disaster

Without even addressing the endless tentacles of an ERP (enterprise resource planning) solutions or other enterprise software, let’s stay with a seemingly simple technology - onboard video.?

1. Imagine you need specific dashcam footage, but it seems to evaporate into the digital abyss immediately after an accident. This footage could clearly document fault, liability or exoneration, or at the very least, shorten the agony of litigation. But you can’t retrieve it!?
2. Or… picture a courtroom drama where a fleet, armed with dashcams, is thrust into a battle of negligence, not due to actual evidence of wrongdoing in this instance, but because of a lack of company policies or, just as damning -? having, but not adhering to them.? More on this coming up.
3. Now… imagine you’re a First Responder organization in a high stakes situation - but the dashcam or bodycam footage vanishes into the digital Bermuda Triangle precisely when it could inform your next steps.

So it is paramount, when selecting a potentially-liability-limiting solution, to select one that will reliably produce the evidence you need, when you need it.? These are the fundamental reasons we look to use technology.

It is equally important, when selecting software that will circulate the lifeblood? for our businesses, that it does so efficiently, deftly, accurately, timely – and in a user-friendly way!

It is therefore critical to select a solution, knowing what problems we are solving for, whether and how the proposed solution may do that, and document the process – so that we can learn from our mistakes.? We will make mistakes.? The only way to not make any mistakes is not to do anything!

One helpful bit of insight we can recognize is the…

Ratio of Initial Costs to Total Cost of Ownership

Some research firms (Gartner, Forrester) say that the initial purchase cost of technology is merely the appetizer; the real feast lies in customization, integrations, ongoing learning, etc..? There is also the potential for the heartbreaking reality of staff saying, "I don't know, I don't care, I don't have time, or I don't have the tools to make this work."? While precise costs for each of these areas will vary by solution and organization: number of affected areas of your business, integrations, and affected Users, a broadly accepted estimate has initial purchase costs as low as 20% of the total cost of ownership.

When Policies Meet Reality - Crafting a Bridge to Tech Success

So, what's the secret sauce for tech success???

It starts with:

• Mapping your current-state and desired-state processes
• Ensuring the proposed solution handily addresses those processes (i.e. Make the provider prove it!)
• Building policies and procedures around your tech endeavors

But hold your horses; the real magic happens when you actually adhere to these. Or catastrophe when you don’t!??

What to do:?

• Make sure your understand, and your potential provider understands, really understands your current “painful present” and desired “brighter future”Then make them SHOW YOU how that will happen
• Check internal policy and procedures compliance on a regular cadence
• Cultivate a culture of continuous learning
• and sprinkle in awareness opportunities for staff and management everywhere you can

Although my examples have been in the transportation realm, where I've spent my career, these truths aren't confined to it, they are a universal reality for any organization, in any industry, attempting to harness the power of technology.

The True Cost of Tech - A Comedy of Wallet Woes

Tech, my friends, has more costs than a big fat Greek wedding. As mentioned, experts whisper that the initial purchase cost of technology is merely an appetizer. Maybe 75-80 percent of the real feast lies in the hidden costs that lurk beneath the surface, like an impetuous tiger ready to make you the meal. Your pre-purchase research, monthly SaaS fees, implementation headaches, integration with other software, custom configurations, costs of the evaluation team time away from other projects? – it's a buffet of expenses.

And let’s keep in view that your tech evaluation team is also juggling multiple full-time endeavors outside this project.

So, am I suggesting you shun technology? Well, that would be about as realistic as convincing your cat to love baths, right??

No, what I'm saying is…

Positive Note - A Silver Lining in the Digital Clouds

One bright spot, for example, SaaS solutions tend to render a positive TEI (Total Economic Impact) for organizations –– when they are done right!

Tech projects, a labyrinth of challenges, have a peculiar way of revealing our vulnerabilities. We’ve only scratched the surface.? And, perhaps we've scraped off a scab or two here with our exploration of tech's darker alleys. That was not the initial intention, I assure you. But it’s been my experience, often enough to be quite painful, that I failed to look for and utilize resources available to me.? Far more often than not, the cost of those resources would have paled in comparison to the expense of my fumblings!

What should I do? - Brew Some Coffee, Let's Chat

I mean - the smell of fresh coffee makes everything better, am I right?

Now, it's your turn. Share your tales of triumph or woe in the comments. Whether you're knee-deep in a tech odyssey or just contemplating a journey into the digital unknown, let's swap stories. I'm no guru, I’m just a guy. But I've been at this station at the gym enough to have gotten in my rep’s?

The only real cost of conversation is in not having them. Coffee's on me – let's chat and maybe navigate the tech maze together. Contact info is in my profile. After all, a problem shared over coffee is a problem on its way to a solution. Cheers to the wild ride of tech projects!