A custom system costs how much?!

I recently made a pitch to a company on providing services to upgrade a custom-built on-line system. While they were excited at the prospect of improving the performance of their system, they were cautious of the costs associated with these improvements. However, it had not occurred to them that the costs of NOT upgrading their system were well in excess of any costs associated with completing the upgrades. I'll explain why ...

The system was a tool developed to help manage aspects of the business. It ran on-line allowing staff to access it from a web-browser. Developed in 2007, the system had a large amount of data within it.

However, despite the fact that the system operated well, the original system was never quite developed along best-practice guidelines and had some inherent problems. The development of the system had been outsourced to developers in another country and from the outset, never quite met expectations. In addition, the lack of direct contact with the development team meant that on-going support and maintenance of the system had left some short comings.

As a result of these short comings over several years, the staff were now compensating for the lack of functionality in the system by performing many functions off line - effectively negating the productivity gains of using technology. And all of a sudden, staffing resources were being used to facilitate the process, rather than being aided by it. This has a cost.

So the options were to fix the system (which by now was a rather extensive project), or continue with the system as-is.

To fix the system would require an outlay of costs - now a significant amount due to the fact that it had not been maintained. Yet the alternative of not completing the work was actually much more costly to the organisation when factoring in the time staff spent on completing work that the system should have completed for them!

So when considering your next IT project - consider both the costs of the solution, as well as the costs of NOT completing the solution. IT projects can be expensive - especially when working with qualified and experienced staff - but the costs of implementing a great IT system (especially when you do it once; and you do it right) often far outweigh the implicit costs of not doing anything at all.

If you're looking to systematise processes and procedures in your business, contact DCODE GROUP to discuss your options. We can look to develop custom web-based systems that provide you with process management and documentation to help assist you business in completing its goals while enforcing best practice operations. As a result, you can see an increase in efficiency as well as being provided with reporting about your businesses operations.

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