Service Integration: the conductor in the cloud

IT developments have sped up so fast that its applications are starting to go mainstream before they even had time to fully develop. Time to bring them all together before it gets out of hand. Please allow me to elaborate…

Remember when we got cars? They started back in the 19^th century as hobby projects for the technically savvy. Cars were DIY projects for the most part, and driving one usually meant building one – or at least employing a few people to keep it running. It took more than a century before we got to a point where cars became available to the general public through mass production, and another decade before an affordable T-model Ford rolled off the first assembly line. I’m not sure when we were finally able to buy a car that doesn’t require any specific engineering skills or insights to keep it running. I do know that nowadays, many of us simply lease a car and leave anything that requires lifting the hood to a dealer.

“Technological development has sped up to a point where technology is launched into the mainstream before it manages to reach that level of maturity.”

Motherboards, drivers, bridge speeds and RAM

We’ve seen a similar development, although decidedly faster, with the pc. People of my age will remember how we used to build our own computers, carefully considering the compatibility of the different parts, reading reviews and experimenting with different setups to ensure maximum performance. My kids however, as digitally savvy as they may be, are pretty much clueless about motherboards, drivers, bridge speeds or RAM. These days, we buy pc’s straight from the shelf, and we don’t even bother to consider possible upgrade routes. We may consider service plans, but certainly not whether a socket type may support a faster CPU in the future.

The funny thing is that it always seemed to me like technology would only break through to mainstream use if and when it had evolved to the point where knowledge of the technology itself was no longer necessary for its operation, and its added value could be consumed without distraction.

Today however, technological development and adoption has sped up to a point where technology is launched into the mainstream before it manages to reach that level of maturity. We are at a point where the use of cloud is considered the new, right and proper way to consume IT services, while in reality, cloud services and the way they create an IT ecosystem with your legacy solutions, still really requires specialist attention.

“If you’re not in the IT business, you don’t want to be distracted by technology, because it’s not your core business.”

IT as an instrument

If you currently think you have adopted the cloud, my bet is that right now, your focus is not on the creation or improvement of business models. I’m fairly certain that right now, your organization is spending most of its time on bringing all those different services, from all those different vendors and sources, together in one comprehensive landscape that may in the end be capable of delivering value.

Obviously, this is not as it should be. If you’re not in the IT business, you don’t want to be distracted by technology, because it’s not your core business. IT is a tool, and like a car or a pc, tools are supposed to perform a function without bothering you with the how. It’s like asking a waiter how he’s doing: you don’t really want to know – you just want him to pour the wine.

So now that you’ve rushed into the cloud, and you find yourself overwhelmed by opportunities and challenges, you need help. It’s like you’ve been presented with a host of great musicians with amazing instruments that are supposed to be capable of playing the world’s greatest symphony – but you’re at a loss as to how you’re going to make them play the music that you want to hear. You were promised an amazing orchestra, and what you got is a DIY project that requires you to divert your attention in order to make them do what they’re supposed to do. You don’t need this. What you need is a conductor.

If you want to make your journey to the cloud a success, you need to make sure you get to a level where all cloud services that are going to help you achieve your goals, are orchestrated in such a way that you won’t have to worry about how it works. Like a car where you never have to look under the hood, a pc whose case you never have to open, or a symphony orchestra that allows you to sit back and enjoy the music. At Solvinity, we call that: Service Integration.

Interested? In my next blog I’ll explain how Solvinity offers Single Point of Service Accountability to ensure that the quality of the joint end product of your entire set of IT services is permanently guaranteed, and that all new and current services are optimized to run fast and smoothly, so you can shift your focus back from trying to get the whole thing up and running to what it can actually do for your organization: create innovations, get from A to B fast, work more efficiently and build the best products you could ever dream of.