Hotel California of technology

Last thing I remember

I was running for the door

I had to find the passage back to the place I was before

"Relax," said the night man

"We are programmed to receive

You can check-out any time you like

But you can never leave!"

Welcome to the Hotel California

Such a lovely place... Such a lovely place.....

This famous Eagles song from 1977 has many interpretations – ranging from LA life to drugs to USA itself. I have a limited interpretation of the last lines with respect to Technology implementations.

Technology is like Hotel California – it's easy to check in but impossible to get out of. So, choose wisely, take your time, ask tough questions, benchmark and seek expert as well as practitioner opinions. Corollary, if you are in a hurry to implement any technology, you will have to pay for it later.

The Hotel California nature of technology is responsible for creation and sustenance of Technical Debt – old technology that you are forced to keep running despite better options available. 

Let’s understand how and why Hotel California. Why is it nearly impossible to change a technology you implemented.

Cost: Of the various cost components, only 20-25% is the cost of the technology, like licenses, hardware, etc. and 80% is incurred during the implementation phase like training, deployment, configuration, coding etc. Therefore, when it comes to throwing away a technology and taking up something else, the exit barriers are very high because you have to incur that 80% of the cost all over again.  

Managing Change: There are various other challenges like data migration, change management, and reskilling your tech resources. Any technology implementation has change management challenges which you have to overcome all over again. Worse, this time the challenges would be tougher as organizational cynicism would have crept in due to the first failure. 

Technology / Vendor / Talent lock-ins: Technology lock-in, vendor lock-in and people lock-in are the other factors. The technology is integrated with multiple others. The inevitability to redo all integrations and interdependencies creates technology lock-in. Your strategic vendor relationships can become a lock-in for you. Worst of all, your team is now well-trained and ready; just when you decide that there is something better around. 

Overcoming the Hotel California challenges of technologies

Rigorous selection: Take your time and spend efforts to benchmark, talk to experts and talk to your fellow practitioners like CIOs in other companies.

Buy product roadmaps, not products: At any point no product will be perfect. Have roadmap discussions with the vendor, study their roadmap to establish your long-term alignment.

Think Platforms and Think Long-Term: Always think long term to build platforms with reusable capabilities, not an application with a specific set of function points. This approach ensures long term thinking, reusability and keeping future options open.

POCs with focus on Integrations: You must do POCs with focus on integrations with the rest of your architecture. The new technology should merge nicely into your tech family.

Never choose a technology in a hurry. Take your time. Look around, check with peers. Do POCs, take opinions from experts and fellow CIOs/technology managers. Keep future options open.

Every technology is like Hotel California – you can check out anytime, but you can never leave. So, choose the good one for your organization.

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The article has been written by Jagdish Belwal, Founder and CEO, Jagdish Belwal Advisory