By Stephen Putman, Senior Consultant
This posting is the fourth in a series discussing various aspects of the financial justification of a metadata management system implementation that are not obvious in many existing analyses. Today, we will discuss the time and effort saved by Information Technology program management staff in system implementation projects.
In Part 3 of this series, the return on investment in a metadata system was shown in relation to end-user reporting groups in your organization. In the fourth and final installment in this series, we will look at how a metadata system can strengthen the program management of the entire system development process.
A great deal of a project manager’s day is spent assembling various lists of functionality to be released into the production environment, and checking the progress of these pieces to ensure that everything is completed in time for the scheduled release. Much of this work is done manually by checking with the various producers, either in person or by status report. It is, frankly, a complicated juggling act that introduces risk into the release process that does not need to be present.
With a robust metadata system, participants in the development and testing of data solutions have a central repository to place updates on the status of various pieces of the product. Unfortunately, status reporting is something that is often neglected, and therefore such a system could easily fall into disrepair. There is a solution that serves all parties, however - the program management group enforces a policy that no piece of software or reporting moves into another state in the standard development-testing-production progression unless the metadata for that piece is complete. This way, the program management staff has an up-to-date view on the status of the entire feature list, and the development staff has incentive to enter data into the system, which benefits all of them during the process and the end-users when the features are released into production. This ultimately saves the organization money in increased efficiency of the entire staff.
A robust and comprehensive metadata system has many benefits to several areas of your organization, and along with effective measurement can provide a large return on your investment in either a purchased or “home-grown” system. It is the basis for effective software development and support in your organization, and should be seriously considered as a best practice for a successful IT function.
photo by perhapstoopink via Flickr
Stephen Putman has over 20 years experience supporting client/server and internet-based operations from small offices to major corporations. He has extensive experience in a variety of front-end development tools, as well as relational database design and administration, and is extremely effective in project management and leadership roles.
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