Embracing the ecosystem

Though many of the architects and architectural frameworks believe that an Enterprise Architecture must closely align with business goals, I tend to see things in its most fundamental derivative. It is important to have an Architecture vision to achieve a business strategy, but equally important it is to understand the importance of the chapter anyone would study in engineering, much before they may study business, that is “The Strength of Materials”. Evolving upon the same underpinning, one must believe in equally acknowledging “The Relevance and Application of Materials” as one of the drivers for Technology, and hence an Enterprise Architecture.

The realization of the concept came to me while watching a Discovery Channel documentary on building Dubai’s luxury hotel Burj Al Arab right off the coast of an artificial beach. Where conventional architects would have chosen the age old way, the project’s lead architect Tom Wright devised an ingenious idea for securing the hotel’s foundation, where the builders drove 230 40-meter long concrete piles into the sand. Thus the foundation is held in place not by bedrock, but by the friction of the sand and silt along the length of the piles, something that was so abundantly available and inexpensive.

Understanding the environment works way more advantageous than applying the stereotypical methodologies. It lets you harness the right potential of your IT infrastructure, and build upon it in a more efficient way to realize the business vision, not only by reducing costs, but also cutting the most important factor today – the Time to Market, letting your business gain that competitive lead over others.

Not every IT material, hardware or software is best designed for all conditions. While some may prove more beneficial to one organization, others have to comprehend the resemblance and dissimilarities in the way their business operate, their market distribution and most importantly, their actual return on investment. They say money saved is money earned, and following this approach can start making (by saving) money even before a project starts simply by investing in the right building blocks.

In my experience, I have often seen architects and decision makers having a holistic view on technology as a business driver while neglecting the environment and the materials that build it. And it all looks so perfect until they stumble upon the limitation of the product and/or the technology to achieve this goal. And so begins a classic battle between the business and the vendor, mightier of which causes either the product to transform or otherwise and in more often cases, change the scope of the project all together. Whichever may be the case, it always works against the business in terms of wastage time and resource.

Thus it becomes very crucial for an architect not to get rapt following a sales evangelist’s idea of latest and greatest, but consider the material’s actual application in context of his enterprise business and realize that:

It’s always better to think twice before than regretting it later

Fruit for Thought!

It’s remarkable how Apple has been getting away so well with every of its audacious propaganda, be it the 3 models of iphones launched in a row to compete with each other, or then an overfed one they called the “ipad”. And with every success, it seems that Apple has quite conveniently assumed the whole world to be going dumber by the day (which apparently does not seem entirely wrong looking at every third person carrying a slice of their fruit), and decided to boast on bringing “a change, again”.

Yes I am talking against the iphone4… which as per Apple “in so many ways, is first”. And indeed it is, but more than what they prophesize in, it is a beacon for the creative wizards of the advertizing world who always wanted to enchant their audience by camouflaging the product.

For those uninitiated innocent souls who are yet ignorant about the iphone4, here’s a quick run-up in comparison of its so called unique features.

• FaceTime: Now this is supposedly iphone’s new video calling feature, with a front facing camera for... (You guessed it right,) videocalls! But c’mon Apple, leave aside the feature, even the name sounds copied (or should I diplomatically say… inspired!). According to Apple’s site “People have been dreaming about video calling for decades. iPhone 4 makes it a reality”! Guys … ever heard of Nokia & Samsung who have been manufacturing dual camera phones since exactly the same decade you are talking about!

• Retina Display: Wow! So attractive does the name “sound” with its contextual “visionary” terms, this seems worth a “look”. With a multimillion color display, the company seems to envisage on providing HD graphical content.  This would have really brought about a difference, only if they would have upgraded their 3.5” screen with a 60” television connected to a blu-ray player playing a $99 disc!

• Multitasking: Well, I don’t know if I should even be writing about it... But if they can... I feel no less embarrassed! The 1st phone I remember ran multiple applications on a symbian platform had started selling even before 1/399th of today’s mobile population got to know what a cell phone was or did... and they came up with it now?

• 5MP camera with Flash and HD recording: The only thing I can say here to its design maestros is “Better late than never fellas... We all learn from our mistakes... Keep trying… and who knows, one day you too can beat Sony & others who have just launched what.. a 12MP autofocus Dual LED Xeon flash cam!”

• And yes of course there are apps for everything that you never needed but made to realize how you must have them, may be this upgrade has one for doing the dishes as well!

• Last but never the least (as a matter of fact, the root the evil) talking about Steve's “Only I must know what I cook  ... If you like it, pay $800 and eat it… if you don’t, pay $800 and I’ll make you eat it! ” policy of theirs, even the “Tech Specs” page on their site does no better than a glossy catalogue shouting out loud “Don’t ask Why Me… just stay stupid & Buy Me!” attitude of theirs.

Lately, I have been writing about the flipside of IT and how this sacred art has been corrupted with the malice of mis-marketing, but more disappointed than the guys advocating it; I am with the rest of the world who are yet not able to free themselves from the spell they have been casted into. It’s not that I am accusing anyone of the “love thy iphone” community, but it’s more of a humble request to “see what you believe… just don’t believe what you are made to see”

So please… The next time “I phone” … don’t just blindly pick it up!

- Sarthak

                                                              

IN conSULTING!

It was the December of 2007 when I landed into planet Pandora, the Big O and coming from an acquainted background, it didn’t took me much time to connect to my new Avatar – The Consultant!  

I was an “Associate” then and it took more than an year for my company to knight me as one of their “Staff Consultant” (Though it sounds embarrassing than “Associate”, guess the company’s intention behind this awkward designation was to convey the message of having adopted me as one of them!)

And even before I could adjust the back rest of the chair or get my own coffee mug, I was exiled to the far end of the habitat earth to fix a shattered architecture, the kind of environment I had never ever seen before.  There were more issues than the product had features, more complexity than it promised to reduce once implemented. Thankfully, after two months of lots of trials and even more of errors, I somehow sailed through the ordeal along with 8000Kms across Indian Ocean. Guess that’s why Vasco Da Gama called it “Kaap Die Goeie Hoop” or the “Cape of Good Hope”.

Sorry if I sounded little off the topic above and coming back to consulting;  which Ironically is tough as there is not much of “coming back” involved in the profession, and even tougher to be speaking “on the topic” for long!

Still haven’t got my coffee mug, this time I was called “urgently” from my vacation for yet another “critical” assignment in Mumbai (Don’t be amused by the language, I am sure all managers use these important sounding words even while making love to their wives!). Fortunately, this time the manager decided to “brief” us before our mission (And I must tell you, it’s a rare occurrence in here). In the next 8.5 minutes, we had our orders clear from the captain… To infiltrate enemy’s camp, get the intel on the deployment our patrolling party had done, and highlight the weak zones in the perimeter. (In short, prepare an audit report on the work Big O had done before and recommend performance improvements!)


And for the coming week, we did just that; by-hearting our boss’s sentiments. Our report was crisp, our report was tough, and worst, our report pointed back to us! This was when my boss got over his emotions and wiped off all the measured pain-points in the report and left the generic “English” in it for us to explain to the customer, and I learned my 2^nd lesson in consulting!

Since then, my odyssey has taken me to vivid places, projects and accounts. And as per Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, it was impossible to map my project with location and my skill set at the same time. So whether it be the ‘JTA crash’ in Gurgaon, or the ‘JMS hang’ in Chennai, my ears have become oblivious to the helpless cries of people who pay for my expenses.

Not sure if this is what is called to be IN ‘con’ SULTING …

Guess we’re losing IT...

It hasn’t been too long since the day I was first introduced to a cell phone and I still remember how I was captivated by the sheer technology the device had got, as now humans could connect to each other on the move! That was yet another day I bowed to the great masterminds of technology for bringing this world closer and making it a better place.

But that was then when the world saw a revolution, when science portrayed itself as art with the beauty of human connect. But alas! Most of it that followed seems to be driven more by commerce than by the idea for enriching lives. Guess that’s the reason why, when it wasn’t enough selling high definition LCD TV for 4 years in a country with no HD signal so far, they decided to make our 2 inch movie actors on tiny mobile screens sparkle in HD! (If only they also provided magnifying lenses with it)

It may be that since I have just started swimming and nudging only the shallow waters, I am quite oblivious to what lies in this deep, dark ocean of IT. So it’s fairly possible that my vision of IT is a consequence of the deviation due to the change in refractive index between my ‘solid’ eye v/s their ‘liquid’ business. But then, as they say, ‘the first impression may not always be the last impression, but it sure is the lasting one’, I am a victim of my own disparity..

Not considering (while acknowledging) the few of the bunch who are actually trying hard researching good for the society, I guess most among the rest of us are busy reinventing the early man’s iconic wheel and, despite searching on the great ‘G’ to get the specifications for that perfect design, end up delivering a bumpy ride to the customer. And then when the poor soul comes back with his misery, we always have an ‘upgrade’ or ‘change request’ waiting for him… After all, the guy ‘we hired’ to decide ‘our vision’ had written customer centricity on the top of other statements!

And all thanks to the great business schools of the world that taught some the art (yes they claim it be an art) of selling refrigerators in Alaska, now our customers have got more ‘solutions’ than their problems, which eventually becomes a bigger problem, for which of course our geniuses would have another solution.

Remembering the prayer from my school that read “Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our sins...” it feels ironical how we skip our lunch for work, put in late hours depriving our loved ones of our presence at dinner and yet claim to be “earning for our daily bread”. Isn’t it too much of a sin to beg pardon for? And the greater paradox comes from our corporate giant’s mission statements, while some proclaim making the “world a smarter planet”, others blow their horns about spreading “information” and “applying thoughts” which at times appears so fancy, it makes us completely overlook the intention printed between those lines that they as well as we vowed to ourselves the day we entered these air-conditioned, access regulated, fully carpeted, cubicle separated, electronically driven flamboyant jungles with coffee fountains that “We couldn’t care less about innovation before our own pockets to flood out and the business cards to read a designation more important than the name! ”

Concluding IT, and borrowing the spirit from Mr. Perfectionist’s recently released art that embarked upon the spirit of striving for excellence and let success follow, I lift my eyes above & beyond these high rise enterprises, lighting up its windows as the sun fades away, "mocking stars of this pseudo galaxy..."

- Sarthak