Lots of Trouble, Usually Serious…
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I drive a 20+ year old Lotus – It’s my ‘daily driver' and has never let me down.
A Lotus is a high performance car. And like all things ‘high performance’ there are well defined preventative maintenance schedules and repair processes. When experienced and knowledgeable experts, follow these well defined processes, use the right tools, use quality components, etc. you are able to enjoy the benefits of owning a ‘high performance’ thing…
When out of ignorance or cost cutting, you don’t follow the service schedules, use cheaper parts, do DIY without the right tools, experience, knowledge, or use non-specialist groups to carry out repair and maintain your high performance ‘thing’, you’ll soon end up in 'lots of trouble, usually serious' (LOTUS)!
Big blue chips often use the term ‘high performance’ to describe themselves, their teams, processes, etc. ‘high performance’ businesses need to be run on ‘high octane’ decision making, and this is dependant on them having the right management, tools, people, culture, etc. to manage and maintain their data and information assets.
I therefore read with great interest about the goings on between Centrica - British Gas (CBG) and Accenture – a LOTUS example if ever there was one!
Whilst CBG want Accenture’s head, I suspect they need to be taking a very close look at themselves. If CBG had a ‘culture of information’ they would have the accountabilities, strategies, governance, people, processes and technologies necessary to ensure that this situation was never allowed to get anywhere near this bad.
There is no way Accenture would have taken accountability for the data quality issues experienced, the lack of documented/up to date meta data, the lack of understanding, management and control of end to end data life-cycles across CBG’s web of systems/databases. Nor can Accenture be responsible for the lack of understanding and controls about business processes, business data definitions, business reference data, exception handling, or missing data ownership. I could go on... Ownership (and therefore blame) of the situation at CGB sits squarely with the management at CBG.
Don't get smug. Like the majority of big blues, years of neglect has created a situation where virtually every project they try to run involving data and information ends up as a LOTUS project – Lots Of Trouble, Usually Serious!
So like the old neglected classic Lotus that often turns up in an old barn to become someone’s dream, it will take a lot of time, money, dedication, sweat and tears, to put right the many years of neglect....
