Blog: Craig Schiff

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Reasons to be Fearful, Part I

As we start the new year I'd love to be optimistic and believe that people have learned from their past mistakes. Unfortunately I keep finding examples that prove just the opposite to be true. As an example here is an IT chat room post, unedited except for the removal of the name of the guilty party:
"I am having Vendor seminar as part of the BI selection process. The participants in the seminar are Board and management level. After each vendor demo I am planning to have feedback forms with parameters to rank. Could anyone suggest parameters?"
That last line is the killer. He's asking us to suggest what they should look for in a BI vendor. Obviously they have neglected the most important first step in the process: determining their detailed requirements. Then maybe, I don't know, they could possibly rank the vendors on their ability to meet their requirements! What a waste of time for the vendors and the company's senior management. They might as well pick a vendor out of a hat.

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