The objectivity question
Service providers taking stakes in software vendors, however, inevitably raises the question of their objectivity. Or at least it should, experts say.
"Users increasingly have to step up and take more authority and more management control over these projects," said Peter Burris, an analyst at Meta Group, in Stamford, Conn. "To assume that an integrator's value is entirely predicated on technology agnosticism is to utterly miss what one can get out of an integrator. At the end of the day, you look to integrators to supplement your capabilities."
That's what Parks does when he undertakes a big technology project at NorthPoint. Parks turns to consultancies more for their integration capabilities and the product experts they can bring to a project. But, he said, he doesn't want his service provider setting his strategy or selecting products.
"We don't rely upon integrator recommendations for our production and operational environment," said Parks, in San Francisco. "I'm going to make decisions about where I want to go anyway."
NorthPoint in September 1999 began implementing an operations support system with the help of Pricewater houseCoopers. It combines CRM software from Siebel, of San Mateo, provisioning software from Syndesis Ltd., of Toronto; billing management software from Portal Software, of Cupertino, and integration middleware from Vitria Technology, of Sunnyvale. All the applications were customised to allow NorthPoint to conduct online provisioning and management of its digital subscriber line service. Parks said NorthPoint, not Pricewaterhouse Coopers, made the final call on each of those products.
At the height of the implementation, NorthPoint used about 100 consultants from PricewaterhouseCoopers, but now that number has been cut by two-thirds since the system went live in mid-April. It's now going through refinements, Parks said.
Parks calls the project a success so far, and he's hopeful that PricewaterhouseCoopers' business practicesâ€"particularly its relationship with vendors like Sunâ€"won't change if the HP deal goes through.
"To me, these linkages don't have much impact," Parks said. "As long as they do a good job at what they do well, and we make decisions independently, I don't see a conflict of interest."
Another approach to ensuring that a consultant is giving unbiased advice is to get a second opinion. Gary Sutula, senior vice president and CIO at commercial printer R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co., uses more than one consulting company to assess the technology needs for his largest projects.
"It's a myth to think you can bring in a systems integrator at the beginning and delegate responsibility for architecture to the integrator," Sutula said.
Sutula will also mix and match consultants in a given project. In one recent case, Donnelley used Andersen Consulting to lead its replacement of 8,000 desktops companywide and an upgrade of 5,000 more as part of year 2000 efforts. But Sutula also hired a boutique integrator, Omnikron Systems, of Calabasas, to help in the process. Using more than one systems integrator avoids one consultant having too much control over a project, Sutula said.
Beyond balancing consulting companies, Sutula also does due diligence in figuring out the expertise of specific service providers and of the consultants handling his projects. Just as the companies may be forming alliances with specific vendors, they also have varying levels of experience and skills in different technologies. Most important is having final "résumé control"â€"in other words, being able to handpick the specialists from consultancies and integrators that will work on a proj ect, Sutula said.
"The last thing you want is a consultant to come in and not be familiar with the technology you're implementing and use you as a test," Sutula said.
While savvy IT managers like Sutula and Parks may be taking steps to retain control of technology decisions and keep an eye on service provider/ vendor ties, too often clients either aren't aware of or aren't even much concerned with their consultants' relationships with vendors, Consulting Information Services' Rodenhauser said. When the issue does come up, it's often only after an implementation has failed, he said.
