From the April 2009 issue of Ceridian Connection.

by Harwell Thrasher © MakingITclear, Inc.

Through impassioned campaigning, you've finally received the green light for a new human resource information system, workforce management or recruiting system. Now comes the really challenging part, actually making the decision to build, buy or outsource a new IT product or service.

In this article, IT expert and author Harwell Thrasher provides a list of common criteria for IT product or service selection, and gives recommendations for improving the process. Learn how to fine-tune your product selection process so you get the best solution for your true business needs.

The Most Common Product Selection Criteria

1. A checklist of "requirements"
   This sounds like a good way to select a new HR/payroll system. But most checklists are just "wish lists" and make no distinction between what's essential and what's nice-to-have. In a simple pass/fail product selection, you narrow your list of solutions by eliminating candidates that can't provide items on this checklist. The vendors know how this game is played, so they include capabilities in their feature lists that match the most common checklist items. Unfortunately, some vendors may stretch the truth. If their product or service really doesn't provide a certain capability, they may figure out a narrow case in which the product "sort of" fits the checklist description. Or they'll provide a clumsy workaround to address the need and then claim to have the capability.
   
   A checklist of requirements is a good foundation for product selection if you:
   
   • Limit the requirements to what you really need now, plus what you think you'll need in the future. Put "nice-to-have" features in a separate list, and don't eliminate a potential product for failing to provide a "nice-to-have" item.
   • Demand that vendors show you exactly how each checklist item is provided by their solution. If the explanation seems the least bit contrived, talk to current customers of the vendor who are using the capability the vendor claims to provide. Make absolutely sure that the vendor isn't satisfying the requirement in name only without the commitment to provide the complete capability in an easily usable way.
2. The one your manager wants
   Don't take your manager's word for it. Follow through with the other selection criteria and decide independently whether you agree with that choice. If you end up agreeing, you'll have reasons to support the decision. If you disagree, you'll need all the ammunition you can get to make the case that you ought to go with an alternate vendor.
3. You trust the vendor
   Your job is on the line based on this decision, and you'll feel more comfortable working with a vendor you trust. That trust can come from the size of the vendor, the vendor's financial stability or a proven track record of vendor sales to your company. It will often come from personal relationships that you've built with vendor representatives. You ought to make an effort to build a relationship with competing vendors. Find out whether you can trust them, too. Remember, trust often depends on things staying as they are. But people change jobs, and companies rise and fall. Trust is important, but it shouldn't be your primary selection criterion.
4. The vendor or product is a "name brand"
   If you hear a lot about a vendor or product in the press -- even if the vendor's marketing is generating most of that publicity -- then you're more likely to trust the vendor or product. See #3.
   
   There's a second aspect of name brands that ought to be considered. Vendors, products and services that are recognized as leaders often have a larger availability of skilled talent, and there's likely to be more third-party training available. How will you install, customize, support and train for the solution if you buy it? If external resources are in short supply, what alternatives do you have? Factor their prices (including any travel required to bring in support or training from outside your city) into your total cost decision.
5. Recent publicity for the product
   This is often the impetus for looking at a new system. Your CEO or another executive hears about the tremendous advantage that a certain product provides to another company and requests the product. Recent publicity tends to make the publicized product or service the front-runner in an evaluation, but try to be objective. Sometimes a less publicized solution will be a better fit for your business.
6. You -- or your boss -- like the salesperson
   This is not a good reason to buy a product. See #3 and #2.
7. The price of the product or service
   Don't look at price; look at total cost instead. The total cost of a solution is the price of the product plus all of the installation, customization, migration, training, adaptation, maintenance and support you'll have to do or pay for. That is often quite different from the simple price. For example, a product that is less expensive might not have a key capability that your business needs. This means you'll have to pay for obtaining or developing a custom version of that capability. Make sure the work on that capability is factored into your total cost.
8. The product fits your current or future IT architecture
   One of the primary contributors to excessive IT cost is the maintenance and support of divergent architectures and platforms due to product decisions that are made without taking IT architecture into account. Involve your IT organization in the product selection process -- even for outsourced services (which often exchange data with existing systems). The IT organization will let you know which product choices are more compatible with their IT architecture and strategy. They will help you compare the long-term IT costs of each alternative.
9. The reliability, resilience, security and auditability of the product
   Business tends to take these factors for granted, and people assume that all products are equal in this area. That's not always the case. Even if a product works most of the time, how much trouble is it to deal with the occasional failure? Can the product be properly supported in a resilient environment that automatically deals with hardware or network failure? Will the product increase the likelihood of security breaches or data leaks? And how easy is it to investigate transactions that appear to be invalid, inappropriate, or even illegal? Include minimum standards for these factors in your requirements (see #1), and insist on hard evidence from the vendors that your standards will be met.
10. Ease of use
    Our focus on requirements checklists (see #1) often neglects the way in which a particular requirement is met, even though the usability of the system will be critical in the long run. Large solutions are complicated, and it's impossible to investigate ease of use for every capability in every prospective product. To simplify your selection process, follow the 80/20 rule. This tells us that you will spend 80 percent of your time using only 20 percent of the system's capabilities. Learn what the users will do with the new product. Observe how time is spent in the current business process. Identify the processes and capabilities that will get the most use and attention, and focus on determining the ease of use -- as well as speed of use -- for those capabilities.
11. Flexibility and adaptability
    You want the flexibility to be able to fit the product into your current environment. Vendors typically provide two ways to do this:
    
    • Parameterization is the adaptation of the software or service by changing settings, values or parameters. No actual change to the product is required, and no software code has to be written.
    • Customization requires actual software to be written, possibly as subroutines, extensions, or interfaces.
    
    A product that can be adapted to your needs using parameterization is preferable to a product that requires customization. The fundamental problem with customization is that you're adding on to the product beyond the vendor capabilities. When the vendor modifies the product in future releases, your customization may no longer work correctly. In the long run, customization will be a major issue, and maintenance of customization will be a significant expense.
    
    Even if you succeed in fitting the product to your current needs, you also want product adaptability to deal with unknown future changes in your company, your business and your requirements. Your business will evolve. A more adaptable product can be changed -- often by using parameterization -- to protect your product investment against future needs.
    
    Make flexibility and adaptability important criteria, particularly as a tie breaker between two more-than-adequate alternatives. Go with the product that supports your current needs through parameterization rather than customization, and that seems to be more adaptable to handle any business changes on the horizon.
12. Do you really need the product at all?
    Try not to buy a solution for emotional reasons. Look at the real total cost of the product (see #7) and the real total benefit from investing in the product. Make sure that the difference (benefit minus cost) exceeds the risk of all of the issues possibly introduced by using such a product. If the difference doesn't exceed the risk, then stay with what you have.

Conclusion
Choosing a new human resource information system, workforce management system or recruiting system may be one of the most important decisions of your career. If you focus on core requirements, work jointly with your IT organization, emphasize flexibility and adaptability, and buy from a trustworthy vendor, then you'll be rewarded with happy users and fewer headaches. And ultimately, a successful decision will advance your career.

Harwell Thrasher is the author of Boiling the IT Frog: How to Make Your Business Information Technology Wildly Successful Without Having to Learn Anything Technical. Learn more at www.makingITclear.com.