Think Strategically, Proceed Practically
Knowing the strategic solution is only part of the challenge. Let’s assume you are able to establish the “right and just” solution either because your enterprise has well documented target architectures and roadmaps or your solution has a well established “best practice” pattern you can apply.
Take a moment to savor your success, but only a moment! Now let this sobering thought sink in – your awesome design brings zero business value to your organization until it is instantiated and running in production. Zero. No business value at all.
In most cases, designing the strategic solution is the easy part of the challenge. Let’s review the remaining roadblocks between you and providing business value, then discuss the winding path to success.
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Hey, Did You Get My Message?
There are different ways for applications to talk to one another. These can include:
- File Transfer
- Web Services
- Shared Data
- Messaging
All have their strengths and weaknesses but for now let’s focus on the advantages of messaging.
Documenting Design Decisions
Prose: Great for Novels, Lousy for Solution Design
While we often find ourselves advocating for design documentation, we typically are referring to “some” design documentation vs. “more” design documentation. When it comes to design documentation, more is actually not better. We have encountered customers, and even other consulting firms, that deliver design documentation by the inch – measuring design quality horizontally across the binding. We recommend not doing this!
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