Quocirca's Straight Talking: Choose the right vendor

Don't want your company to get stuck with an IT vendor that will disappoint you later on? Try this evaluation process outlined by Quocirca's Clive Longbottom.

In Quocirca, we see a lot of companies sitting on technologies chosen for all the right reasons - but which are now acting as gating factors to the business going forwards. As we move into a new era of technology buying based on business requirements, we cannot allow this to keep happening. This raises the question: how can we help to minimise the risks of backing ourselves down a technological cul-de-sac?

Companies now have to tread the narrow line between taking new technologies from new sources to give tactical advantage and taking the safe route of dealing only with vendors with which they already have existing relationships. However, with windows of opportunity shrinking in the market, balancing tactical and strategic needs can often blur the decision making process. Quocirca has come up with a means of helping buyers ascertain whether the vendor can be trusted for the future.

This approach revolves around the capability of the vendor to paint a long-term vision and also demonstrate exactly how it proposes to get to that vision.

It's all about mapping functionality against time. First do a bit of research on the web, talk with your peers or with your friendly independent analyst around the technology area that you are interested in. This will give you expected upper and lower levels of functionality in 60 months' time.

For example, if we are to look at the communications/collaboration sector, should we be looking at broadcast quality video and sound to mobile devices in five years' time? Or will we be happy if it is just that, finally, 80 per cent of the UK will have a good level of 3G access, with 4G access in certain metropolitan areas?

Do the same for 24 months, for 12 months and for six months. Again, as an example, let's continue with the communication/collaboration theme. In 24 months, should we be expecting full involvement for mobile users within web conferences involving data and application sharing? In 12 months, we would be hoping for 3G to have provided greater capabilities for data communication and in six months we are probably looking at full scale deployments of GPRS-enabled projects.

Now go and sit down with your vendor and get them to paint you its five-year vision. Hopefully, it will fit within your expected functionality limits - otherwise, you've hit an immediate problem with that vendor.

If they pass this test, get them to tell you exactly where they will be in six months' time. The vendor should be able to tell you pretty closely where they expect to be in this short a time, as the work will already be going on in the labs and it would be difficult to make any serious changes to development plans. Talk about the 12- and 24-month periods as well. The vendor may become vague here but you should still be able to gain enough information to let you compare their vision against your expectations.

It is important to do the views in this order - the 'vision' first, followed by the short, medium and longer-term views, as you are testing out their capabilities to go from where they are now to the vision they have so nicely painted.

Hopefully, the vendor's projections sit nicely within your expectations. If so, this shows a vendor who is not only thinking ahead but is planning ahead as well - a relatively safe bet for you to deal with. But sometimes, the vendor's projections are less certain and drift outside of your expected limits. This should be where the alarm bells begin to sound - the vendor may have the long-term view under control but does not have the road map of how to get there. These vendors will be the ones who will suddenly have to change direction and who utilise technologies which have to be ripped and replaced on a regular basis and will have the most negative impact on a company's capabilities in the marketplace.

Indeed, even with those who can show a nice smooth road map, you should go back to them on a regular basis (say, every six months) and go through the same process. Each time, before you check with the vendor, review your view of the world - you should end up with a new set of functionality that fits within the previous predictions. Get the six-, 12-, 24- and 60-month views from the vendor.

The net result should not be markedly different from your previous research - but may differ due to changes in the market or your own requirements or the adoption of new technologies. It is only when the vendor's outlook differs considerably from the previous one that you should be worried - here's a vendor that is chasing flavours of the day or the latest bandwagon, and is less bothered over protecting its customers from the dangers of changing technologies for technology's sake.

Although this approach does not guarantee success, it gives you a better view into a vendor's thought processes, enables you to compare vendors against each other and also allows you to weed out those vendors who just look blank and wonder why you would want to know their views. If nothing else, it's a bit of fun - and with today's battle of technology in the business environment, that can't be too bad.