New Language of Business

You could characterize the view of technology over the last 10 years, and its role in the businesses bottom line, as the swinging of a pendulum. During the late 90s, traditional companies became caught up in the dot-com boom and were wildly throwing money at IT with the belief that ROI was guaranteed and the first business in would gain the competitive advantage. When the ROI did not materialize, the pendulum swung to the other extreme with the belief that IT had been commoditized and should be managed like any other utility. Today, the pendulum has settled in the middle, where the connection between business and IT will deliver the promised business value. SOA is at the heart of the new way forward. For the next few years, the agenda is very simple: Innovate and grow your business. Because of the amazing technology like video face recognition, RFID, SOA and other emerging technologies that companies possess today, CEOs are looking to harness IT and process advances to exponentially grow their businesses. The New Language of Business: SOA and Web 2.0 is not about technology for the sake of technology - it is about enabling new ways of doing business. It is about helping an organization to reach new levels of innovation while continuing to deliver the increases in productivity that are necessary to improve the bottom line. Allowing the company to lower costs, increase revenue and respond quickly to industry pressures."This book clearly shows how today's industry pressures and business challenges mandate renewal of the contract between organizations and their IT assets and people-and it illustrates how a service-oriented approach to IT can help organizations go through the necessary transformation. The role of governance in bringing IT and business closer together is particularly well explained, and the book is worth reading for that alone." -Neil Ward-Dutton, Research Director, Macehiter Ward-Dutton "It's easy to pay lip service to the concept of business/IT alignment, but in The New Language of Business, Sandy Carter walks the walk. Few treatments of SOA ground this admittedly difficult topic in the world of business as thoroughly as Sandy has here. I'd recommend this book to any business reader who wants to leverage IT to make their business more agile and innovative, and to any technical reader who wishes to understand how to place SOA in the business context where it belongs." -Jason Bloomberg, Senior Analyst and Principal, ZapThink LLC "A very valuable read. In today's globally connected marketplace profitable growth requires business flexibility and continuous innovation, both of which are increasingly proving to be impossible without business modularity and the new table-stakes technology SOA." -Ron Williams, Professor, Kenan-Flagler Business School, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill "Sandy has provided a pragmatic and holistic perspective on Service Oriented Architectures. She adds credibility by sharing IBM's in-depth customer research as well as case studies to support the findings. The book is a strong source book for those wanting to get started with SOA." -Judith Hurwitz, President & CEO, Hurwitz & Associates, coauthor, Service Oriented Architectures for Dummies "Few people have thought as long or as hard about SOA as Sandy Carter. This book embodies her invaluable work and the work of many at IBM to research, define, deploy and make SOA happen. Useful not just from a SOA perspective, but also as a concise articulation of the contemporary concepts fundamental to understanding where business and IT are heading." -Carol Baroudi, coauthor Service Oriented Architecture For Dummies, Senior Analyst, Aberdeen Group "The New Language of Business: SOA & Web 2.0is based on the collective feedback from industry leaders at organizations of all sizes, in more than 50 countries, who shared their views, experiences, and challenges of aligning technology with business goals."-From the foreword by Steve Mills, Senior Vice President and Group Executive, IBM Software Group There is now a direct, provable link between an organization's flexibility and business performance. To optimize flexibility, companies must achieve unprecedented levels of integration and automation of key processes and infrastructure, both internally and externally. At the same time, they must learn to manage their processes far more dynamically and responsively. They must become flex-pon-sive*. Until recently, technology stood in the way of achieving these goals. Thanks to the emergence of service oriented architecture (SOA), Web 2.0, and open standards, technology now enables companies to achieve those goals. In The New Language of Business, one of IBM's top SOA strategist demonstrates how business leaders can use innovations in technology to drive dramatic process improvements and support accelerating change. Sandy Carter shows how to deconstruct your business into a "componentized" business model, then support that model with linked, repeatable IT services that can adapt quickly, easily, and economically. These techniques will help both IT professionals and business leaders reach new levels of operational excellence to deliver the market-focused innovations that matter most. Drive competitive advantage through Service Oriented ArchitectureLeverage the value of business process components and IT services Achieve one version of the truth-finally!Use information as a service to improve business insight and reduce risk Master SOA governance and the service lifecycleManage IT infrastructure for business results, both short-term and long-term Start fast: choose from three winning approachesGet quick wins with business process management, collaboration or information Implement on demand: what works-and what doesn'tDiscover key success factors-and ten critical mistakes to avoid Create the flex-pon-sive* business! *Learn the secrets of success from industry leaders at organizations of all sizes, from over 50 countries-and why SOA was unanimously chosen as the best way to address their challenges *Leverage the IBM roadmap for SOA and Web 2.0 deployment, plus proven best practices learned in the field *Understand what it means to be flex-pon-sive*-and how your organization can get there In The New Language of Business, senior IBM executive Sandy Carter demonstrates how to leverage SOA, Web 2.0, and related technologies to drive new levels of operational excellence and business innovation. Writing for executives and business leaders inside and outside IT, Carter explains why flexibility and responsiveness are now even more crucial to success-and why services-based strategies offer the greatest promise for achieving them. You'll learn how to organize your business into reusable process components-and support them with cost-effective IT services that adapt quickly and easily to change. Then, using extensive examples-including a detailed case study describing IBM's own experience-Carter identifies best practices, pitfalls, and practical starting points for success. Build the flex-pon-sive* business * Flex-pon-sive* companies respond with lightning speed and agility to rapidly changing business needs. Flex-pon-sive* companies are focused on processes that are enabled for change through IT. Foreword Part I: Start at the Beginning-The BusinessChapter 1: The Innovation Imperative Chapter 2: What Is Flex-pon-sive*? Chapter 3: Deconstructing Your Business: Component Business Model Part II: A Flexible Business Requires Flexible IT Chapter 4: SOA as the DNA of a Flex-pon-sive* and Innovative Company Chapter 5: SOA Key Concepts Chapter 6: SOA Governance and Service Lifecycle Chapter 7: Three Business-Centric SOA Entry Points Chapter 8: What about Web 2.0 and SOA? Are They Related? Part III: How to Implement Flex-pon-sive* in Your Business Chapter 9: The Top 10 Don'ts! Chapter 10: Case Study: IBM Chapter 11: Putting It All Together Glossary Index