So
Does your e-Business Provider have Internationally Recognized Tools in its Digital
Business Consulting Toolkit?
E. Robins - February 25th, 2000
Event Summary
PriceWaterhouse
is playing the game of minimizing risk (they read preparedness) in the digital-business
sphere. In many ways, they are right in thinking that digital-business preparedness
has a major influence on the decision of what you need to do to accomplish the
goal of a digital presence in the marketplace, with the least risk. Some 75%
of businesses fail in this sector (the rate for projects in most established
corporations could be much less).
EMM@ works much like a checklist of corporate internal procedures and capabilities
by drilling down through various levels of its decision-tree model. According
to Chris Kinsey, EMM@ Program Manager, EMM@ is becoming the e-business research
platform standard at leading universities throughout the world who are part
of the PwC Knowledge Alliance.
Market
Impact
In
the current hectic environment of e-business development, particularly B2B,
the advantages of, for example, moving to an e-procurement or Internet based
supply chain management process far outweighs the risks involved, if only from
the ROI perspective. An experienced DBSP (Digital Business Service Provider)
should be able to give the guidance the client needs. However, there's the rub
- do they have the tools? In that case EMM@ is pointing in the right direction.
Many
e-business activities are recreations of old businesses, extensions of brick
and mortar businesses, and entirely new businesses for which the tool has little
application. Thus the market impact, if any, will be in the high-end markets
of the Fortune 1000.
User
Recommendations
User's should be generally aware that there are very few standardized management
consulting tools in the toolkits of DBSP's that have been independently tested
and verified. Though EMM@ is probably of limited usefulness in particular cases,
it is worth determining what tools and capabilities a DBSP has at its disposal,
what it has created on its own, and if the process covers your industry, business
processes, and corporate culture.
EMM@ would provide a DBSP with a standardized tool. It probably should be used
once the corporate implications of the business' digital strategy have been
worked out. Most process changes on the broad scale should have been evaluated,
making the tool a checklist against what you want to do, not necessarily as
to what exists today.
Remember,
as well, the model may be a bit like one-shoe-fits-all. As Karel De Baere of
Pricewaterhouse puts it "(the model) comes with its own value chain analysis".
Managers
in large corporate organizations may also benefit from using the tool as a preliminary
step in assessing their business preparedness, but probably with assistance
from a consultant who can customize the tool to the client needs.
Pricewaterhouse
plans to license the tool sometime later this year. It might be worth a check
for DBSPs to see whether it fits with your toolkit. The same is true for senior
managers in the FORTUNE 1000 if you're still looking at that point of going
digital.
Glossary
B2B: Business-to-Business
CMM:
Capability Maturity Model
DBSP:
Digital Business Service Provider
EMM:
E-business Maturity Model
ROI:
Return on Investment