SOA Vendors Need to go to SOA School

I ran across Joe McKendrick’s blog post reporting on a fact that I’ve raised several times…SOA vendors don’t understand SOA, and it’s frustrating end users.

“ZDNet’s Steven Deare reports that the IT head of one large financial services firm says that despite pronouncements to the contrary, vendors don’t seem to get — or maybe just don’t want to get — SOA.

ING, which is three years into its services transformation strategy to integrate the systems of 20 companies it had acquired during this time, has been disappointed by lack of understanding from vendors, and their continued insistence on pushing their own proprietary software.”

This is a huge issue in the adoption of SOA. In essence, vendors are pushing and hyping so much, that it’s actually hindering the adoption of SOA. I hear this from my clients all of the time, and as much as I attempt to educate the vendors I work with, many are just not listening.

Here are a few things that vendors can do:

1. Understand SOA is a holistic change, and your product is only part of the solution.
2. Guide your users as to the value of your product within the context of SOA…don’t sell “SOA in a box.” There is no such thing.
3. Define your strategy, and make sure to understand the customer requirements before pushing your product.
4. Be prepared to walk away from deal where you’re not a fit. You would be surprised how many of those customers invite you back when you are.
5. SOA is something you do, not something you buy.

There are some real issues here, and my larger concern is that the vendors, who don’t understand SOA, will kill it as a concept before it has had a chance to prove its value within many organizations.