Feb 19, 2008
SOA---Is it Buzz or Best Practice?
SOA stands for “service oriented architecture.” Unlike the term CRM, which was relatively easy to understand because of the words “customer relationship,” SOA is a much fuzzier concept. SOA is a collection of services that communicate with each other.
By Scott Draeger, EDP, Senior Product Manager, Exstream Software
Remember when CRM was the IT buzzword of the 1990s? Companies were implementing CRM, they were leveraging CRM, and they were rolling out CRM to improve customer satisfaction. We knew CRM was most likely a good thing, but did anyone really grasp what it meant when it first appeared? There are so many new IT acronyms continually appearing---even IT is an acronym!---that it’s often difficult to keep track of it all, much less understand what each means and has to offer.
Such is the case with SOA, which by this time most know stands for “service oriented architecture.” Unlike the term CRM, which was relatively easy to understand because of the words “customer relationship,” SOA is a much fuzzier concept. A service-oriented architecture isn’t just a single thing, but a collection of services that communicate with each other.
“Services” typically implement functionalities most of us would recognize as a real service, such as the ability to fill out an online application for a new account, viewing an online statement, or placing an order. These types of services are self-contained and do not depend on the context or state of the other service. Instead of services embedding calls to each other in their computer source code, protocols are defined that describe how one or more services can communicate. This type of architecture, then, relies on a business process expert to link and sequence the services to meet a new or existing business system requirement.
It’s important to note that SOA is often used interchangeably with “Web Services.” The fundamental value of Web Services is that they make it easier to connect multiple, disparate systems to reduce time to market and integration costs---a primary objective of SOA. Web Services are a common industry standard method used to support a service-oriented architecture. SOA allows loosely coupled Web Services to publish their capabilities to potential users, who can then access these services using the Internet.
As a set of technologies and practices, SOA makes it more efficient to share data and transactional capabilities between internal and external systems in a reusable way. This allows the value of systems investments to be leveraged repeatedly in subsequent initiatives. In other words, SOA allows organizations to perform business process redesign by building more efficient process-driven architectures.
From a business strategy perspective, SOA leverages information to meet big picture, organizational objectives, such as decreasing costs, increasing revenue, retaining more customers, reducing product defects, and enhancing operational flexibility.
Analyzing the benefits of SOA
Because SOA is based on open rather than proprietary standards, it offers several important benefits, including reusability, interoperability, and integration. What does this mean for your business in concrete terms? Here are some benefits of SOA:
· Easily integrates existing systems with new technologies, business partners, and legacy systems
· Saves time and reduces the cost of integrating with new vendor packages
· Reduces the amount of redundant data spread across multiple systems
· Increases data sharing between systems across the enterprise
· Eliminates duplication of integration work
· Shortens development and testing periods
· Improves data access for end users
· Lowers implementation costs
· Ensures a quicker, more cost-effective response to changing market conditions
· Leverages resources for other strategic investments and new system developments
Proceed with caution
In spite of all the benefits it delivers, SOA is not something to rush into. Many IT professionals became very excited about the process improvements a service oriented architecture could deliver and quickly implemented SOA, only to struggle to achieve positive results. Let’s take a closer look at some common mistakes and possible pitfalls:
The belief that SOA is the be-all and end-all...
SOA is not the answer to every integration challenge within your enterprise. It is imperative for companies that decide to start down the SOA path to first determine which systems, applications, or integration challenges are a good fit for SOA.
SOA is as simple as taking a box off the shelf...
Unfortunately, there is no ready-made SOA solution. Enterprises must perform due diligence when selecting products that are touted to be interoperable and that promise to work within any architecture. Certain software solutions may lend themselves to making services available, but it is important to know what to look for, as well. For example, software that effectively facilitates SOA must be able to read and write to and from application systems such as CRM, BPM, and ERP. Data must be able to be shared through standard file access methods, message queues, and Web Services to acquire content, update systems, or create documents in real time. Truthfully, SOA isn’t as much a product set as it is a methodology for structuring your enterprise and your software solutions must be able to capitalize on the investment.
SOA is solely an IT concern...
IT personnel may have a better, intrinsic understanding of SOA and how it can best be implemented, however, your company’s business needs will ultimately drive the solution. An SOA roadmap that creates services that fail to meet business expectations for re-use, performance, and cost will not succeed. SOA must be embraced as an enterprise-wide endeavor and will therefore require the support and involvement of all your company’s stakeholders.
Strategies for success
There are several key strategies that enterprises can employ to successfully adopt and implement an enterprise-wide SOA solution, including:
Clarifying your vision
Start by stating your mission for SOA implementation. Articulate what you need from service oriented architecture and establish a clear vision for the project and how an enhanced set of services will maximize your product’s core value.
Then build a value proposition that defines the business services involved and that resonates with all the stakeholders within your organization. This needs to include the business benefits your company hopes to achieve, as well as your preferred architecture.
After these initial activities are completed, your team can allocate sufficient funding up-front to support development and kick-start SOA adoption.
Measuring and monitoring performance
Develop key performance metrics to determine whether or not SOA is truly accomplishing what you set out to achieve for your business. Do you want to reduce implementation times by 20 percent? Do you want your people to respond to all customer requests within 24 hours? Be specific in your questions as well as in your answers.
Identifying easily achievable goals that don’t take much effort
It’s important to recognize and identify efforts that provide organizational benefits and can be accomplished in the short term with a minimal investment in resources. Identify, target, and plan improvements that quickly yield benefits to demonstrate that SOA can reduce the time required to implement new or improved applications. These efforts will help the IT department encourage buy-in from the rest of your organization.
Embrace SOA as a differentiator
Although adopting a service oriented architecture seems to be on most companies’ radar screens, much work remains to be done to understand its full implications. However, the benefits that can be realized are almost impossible to ignore. Making your IT infrastructure more agile and responsive to changing business needs and regulations may become the most compelling reason for your company to better understand and fully embrace enterprise technology’s newest acronym—SOA.
Scott Draeger, EDP, is senior product manager at Exstream Software. Exstream Software helps organizations of all sizes connect with their customers through higher quality, fully personalized communications. For more on Exstream >>>>.