Cloud Politics Remain Top of Mind

A few weeks ago I wrote about cloud politics and the role of data integration. The post clearly struck a chord as it continues to be the most popular week after week. No comments, but lots of hits. Maybe people don’t want to expose their own politics…

CIO.com also wrote about the Politics of Cloud Apps. Their warning – Beware of IT Unrest! Well today I read an interesting post that hit many of the same themes:  SaaS Vendor Selection/Implementation Tips: Avoid Having the Cloud Pulled Over Your Eyes (Part 2).

“The biggest challenge with integration (especially SaaS integration) is that the devil is always — and we mean always — in the spend details. When considering specific solutions, especially in a transactional environment, we suggest spending as much time on understanding the integration capabilities of the SaaS/cloud solution (e.g., receiving and providing the types of data discussed above to and from your organization’s legacy systems) as any other area. In plain terms, you need to discover how open, extensible and simplified the integration layer is of the SaaS solution. Marketing speak may make it sound simple and straightforward, but trust us, we’ve seen this exact detail cause significant angst in many organizations that have had the cloud pulled over their eyes, especially when it comes to managing complicated integration flows and system updates. For example, the ongoing management of supplier lifecycle data — especially when combined with transactional data — can be a significant SaaS integration hurdle that your friendly vendor salesperson isn’t likely to highlight until after the ink on the contract is dry.”

Good stuff. Any experiences to share?