John Levy Consulting (JLC) addresses the Business-IT interface in order to help you get what you need from IT in your business. Here are some of the results you can expect from working with us.
Safe
Working with JLC will keep you safe from major missteps in IT capability development.
In most major IT implementation projects, there is a risk of spending millions of dollars on work that does not result in any useful product or service. This can happen because the process of development follows an old “waterfall” model in which a great deal of effort goes into up-front plans, specifications, designs and documentation. By the time a working model is available for inspection, costs have often passed the half-way point in the budget. Then, discovering that business or market conditions have changed, the project is re-cast to adapt to the current needs, and most of the work done so far is thrown away.
The safe way to implement new capabilities is to define increments that can be built and tried out in short time periods. This allows nearly continuous adaptation to current business and market conditions. In addition, users get to see working prototypes early and often. At each demonstrated increment, stakeholders can reorder the priorities for the next increment so that their confidence in the direction of the project is much greater.
You gain confidence that you are safe from the massive overspending you’ve heard about in other IT projects. IT people on the project are safe from the mutually damaging blame that goes with such overspending.
Tranquil
JLC provides you with both the vocabulary and the technology background information you need to assure steady progress towards business goals, no matter what technology underlies the implementation. This allows you to take a calm approach to defining and paying for a major IT implementation project.
Imagine a world in which IT and Business do not argue over the significance of business goals and IT costs. With the help of JLC mediation, both IT and Business can recognize and communicate the key issues driving implementation of a new capability.
Often, IT simply wants to have recognition for the balancing act involved in maintaining current capabilities while planning for new systems. JLC helps to put these issues into business terms with realistic price tags. We also help IT people express the trade-offs available so you can select the best options.
On the business side, you want IT to offer the most up-to-date technologies while still giving realistic estimates of the costs. JLC helps IT to express these costs in both dollars and in staff loading, so that you can work together to select the optimum mix of well-maintained legacy systems and new technologies.
Healthy & Strong
Healthy business is built on healthy IT systems. For your IT systems to be viable for the long term, you need perspective on how quickly existing system will become obsolete; you need projections of how business demand will grow over time; and you need timely reports on failures and threats to the current systems.
JLC provides insights into the strengths and vulnerabilities of your current IT capabilities. This includes assessment of the IT organization and of the business analysts and project managers who are leading implementations of new and maintenance operations.
There are many potential weak links in IT systems and IT organizations. JLC assists you in reducing risk by identifying these weak links based on our experience in computer systems and management.
Free from Suffering
The last thing you want is to be blindsided by failures or security breaches you did not consider. JLC helps you maintain a healthy business and a strong discipline of IT system review so that you will not have to worry about unexpected events.
Even as the news contains stories of more and more IT systems that have been compromised by neglectful or hostile people, JLC will help liberate you from concern about the future.
IT systems, while complex, can be understood as a collection of components, procedures, and connections. Analysis of systems for risks and threats can be accomplished at various levels; JLC will help you select the right level for analysis based on your budget and your systems’ exposure. We also help you with development of contingency plans and creation of specialized teams to deal with those contingencies.
You can never avoid all risk, but JLC can help you sleep well because you will be confident you have applied your resources to risk reduction at the appropriate level.
Please go on to read about our Values.