Smart data, Anne-Tania Desmettre,
"Business investment in digital transformation is increasing. Despite this increase, the ambitions of such a transformation are challenged by the exploitation of data. One of the reasons for this challenge lies in the legacy of the information system: 72% of architects say that the legacy limits their ability to implement their digital projects and 60% waste their time managing it instead of driving the transformation.
"The legacy: 72% of architects say the legacy limits their ability to implement their digital projects and 60% waste their time managing it instead of driving the transformation."
Complex consequences
Why is legacy an obstacle to digital transformation? It creates consequences of complexity, risk and feasibility. There is certainty around the production results consistently achieved through legacy. There is, however, no certainty of revenue growth that could be achieved if the legacy evolved. Legacy is often the result of a multitude of enhancements making it complex and therefore perilous to transform.
Position of CIOs
CIOs are not presenting legacy transformation as the keystone to successful digital transformation. The approach challenges the CIO position. It is more attractive to discover new technologies in isolation, in a Data Lab, than to try to deploy them in a complex and aging system. Finally, the risk of budgetary drift seems higher.
An isolated digital transformation
It is often the choice of an isolated digital transformation that is made by creating a Data Lab alongside the existing one, often in a public cloud environment. However, it seems to me that the digital transformation of an enterprise has the ambition to produce revenue from its data by delivering the promises made to the business.
A systematic choice
Why is the choice of an isolated digital transformation systematically made? According to 68% of architects, choosing the right technologies for their digital transformation is insurmountable when taking the legacy into account. The simplest answer is "the fashion effect". This is not a sufficient explanation. Indeed, the inevitable curiosity to apprehend new technologies; the impression to be innovative, to increase competence and to be recognized by the installation of a "sandbox" stamped Data Lab, Data Factory... are as many reasons to choose the isolated approach.
A lack of maturity
However, due to the lack of technological maturity in the market and the lack of overall consistency in the transformation, this venture will not deliver on its promise of digital revolution or evolution. Indeed, for the company to make revenue from its data, it must use it connected to the daily operational business in all departments of the company. 80% of organizations operate with relational database management systems, generally connected to different business applications, without unification and therefore without overall consistency in the use of data. The IS is therefore not Customer Centric.
"For the company to make revenue via the exploitation of its data, it must use it connected to the day-to-day operational business in all departments of the company."
Bringing superior operating intelligence
How to get out of it? Only the deployment of a platform whose conceptual data model is natively data-driven (Customer Centric) can meet such an objective. Finally, this platform must also have a particularity: it must be able to exploit the performance of all types of database management engines, whether relational, document or graph-based, from its single conceptual data model.
