SOA is in its formative stages at many companies, either in pilot-project mode or operating under the radar with proofs of concept. The challenge is, as SOA planners and advocates establish the rudimentary beginnings of service oriented architecture involving one, two, or three services, there isn't an obvious need for governance.
However, as SOA projects build, companies later end up playing a catch-up game with attempting to bolt governance procedures on after the fact. Complicating matters is the fact that to be successful, SOA needs to draw on the resources and support of many parts of the business. Developers may be looking at SOA when they build and release the service, but then the operations team needs to be signed on with the concept in the runtime stage. Plus, to ensure reuse, other development teams need to be signed on. Over all this, the business needs to be driving the direction of SOA efforts. Such cooperation can only be accomplished with an effective governance program.
These are the issues we will be exploring at a special governance panel commencing at Noon on September 24, as part of ebizQ's SOA Governance virtual conference.
My ebizQ colleague Peter Schoof just posted this podcast with ZapThink's Jason Bloomberg, which explores his take on the essence of SOA governance. Jason's colleague, Ron Schmelzer, will be joining the September 24th panel.
Jason emphasized the point that SOA governance considerations need to be made right up front, because SOA touches so many different parts of the business. "Early on in the initiative when this just in the planning stage, its very important to tackle SOA governance -- because if you don't think through issues like service versioning, and service maintenance, and discovery over time, then you're not going to be able to achieve the business benefits SOA promises," he said. "Early on, you have the architect team as well as participation from operations, from security, as well as the lines of a business who are driving the business process aspect of the story. As the project moves on, the focus moves more toward deployment and now operations is even more involved."
Next week's panel discussion on SOA governance will be moderated by yours truly, and I will be joined by of some of the biggest names in SOA governance thought-leadership these days (outside of Frank Kenney and Miko Matsumura, who will also be doing presentations at the virtual conference). The roster includes Ann Thomas Manes of Burton Group, Ron Schmelzer of ZapThink, Dan Foody of Progress Software, Frank Martinez of SOA Software, John Michelsen of iTKO, and Ed Horst of AmberPoint.
Now, with all these experts in on one session, THIS ought to be one rousing discussion! Topics to be discussed include the question of whether SOA governance is a part of overall IT governance, and who in the organization should be responsible for SOA governance. We will also tackle the role of ITIL, and what is working for successful organizations implementing SOA.
The upcoming one-day virtual conference, titled SOA Governance, will be held right here at the ebizQ site on September 24th.
The event will kick off with a real powerhouse duo in the SOA governance world: Gartner's Frank Kenney and Software AG's Miko Matsumura will discuss the impact of and the opportunities offered by becoming more service centric and by leveraging SOA.
Actually, the title of the keynote says it all -- "No SOA Governance Strategy? No Problem -- Prepare for Failure!" Frank and Miko will discuss how many SOA projects are not succeeding due to the lack of a solid governance strategy (one that's led by the business!) and due to the lack of proper technologies to enforce those governance polices and processes.
Frank and Miko will demonstrate how to quickly organize for SOA governance. (Hint... you need a high level business sponsor!); how to pick the right governance technologies for your project and company. (Hint... don't throw away that spreadsheet just yet!); and why both smaller vendors and larger platform providers BOTH dominate the market. (Hint... best of breed still makes sense).
To wrap up the event, Forrester's Larry Fulton will explore issues and opportunities around service lifecycle management, the domain of so-called design time SOA repositories. Larry will discuss Forrester's latest insights in service lifecycle management, and provide an overview of the lifecycle management process, the technologies available today to automate this process, and effective strategies for bringing this important process into your organization.
ebizQ's SOA Governance virtual conference will take place next Wednesday, September 24.
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