You Can Only Manage What You Can Measure – The Methodology

[BeSchulze]

By Bert Schulze

In our last posts we learned about the opportunities we gain from capturing and analyzing consumption data.

Part 1 The Subscription Economy
Part 2 Every Day and Cloud and Networked Day
Part 3 You Can Only Manage What You Can Measure - The Technical View
Part 4 You Can Only Manage What You Can Measure – The Business View

We know, that measuring usage provides us with the much needed transparency and furthermore helps decision making. This time we want to talk about how to actually efficiently install and make use of measurement. It is very crucial, that the customer understands the value and
potential benefit coming from transparency. From there we jointly created 16 customer use cases and described value from a customer perspective. This helped to define the data required to serve the use cases. Now we need to identify patterns in order to develop a methodology which makes processes repeatable. Let`s talk about this methodology, which helps to take full advantage of measure usage, with our experts.

Question: How can someone efficiently incorporate usage measurement?

Martin: I endorse GQMA paradigm. One starts with measurement goals which are derived from your business goals.

Question: This kind of model looks to be comprehensive and promising. Can you take us through an example?

Himanshu: Sure. Let us see the use case where Companies´ Project sponsors want to align the success of a project with business objectives. They also want to prove that the solution is well accepted by the end users. This by the way is a joint KPI of IT and the Line of Business executive.

Question: What do you think is important to keep in mind while implementing usage measurement? 

Himanshu: Well this is a good question and the quick answer would be to collect only actionable data. But the problem is how to reach to the actionable data? Thankfully the set of metrics which one will decide in GQMA model really helps to know what actionable data is and then it easy to channelize the focus on what is important. One should also keep in mind that Identifying and involving relevant stakeholders is vital.

Nevertheless, I would say if you can afford to store all available logs and data then go ahead. This is for 2 reasons – first is that over a period of time the cost of storing the data will outweigh the effect of not storing it; secondly today’s technology is ready for big data through the likes of HANA, Hadoop.

Question: What are the ingredients for successful execution of measure usage?

Martin: First and foremost is scale up slowly, big bang approach does not work. Secondly determining how data have to be provided and who will provide is central to usage measurement. I recommend the top down approach wherein one begins with understanding the business needs and then formulating the measurement goals accordingly. Last but not the least; it is imperative to act and at times with iterations.

Question: It is expected that by next year, most of the IT decisions will be taken with direct involvement of LOB Executives. What is your take on this changing buying behavior?

Martin: This is a welcome change and one prominent difference in this change is the willingness of LOBs to first try before they buy. We have seen this in consumer apps and it is no wonder that business executives expect the same for enterprise apps. A trial allows the customer creating a Proof of Concept and a fit/gap sense towards his/her business challenges he or she wants to solve.

Having said that, it is essential for the provider that the service is transparent, easy to understand and tangible. I believe it helps to create the trust and walk the talk focusing on LOB executives.

What do you think about this methodology? Let me know in the comment section below. Also if you are interested into this topic, follow us on twitter for more updates: @BeSchulze, @HSewalkar and @Martin_Guenther