SOA Failures Traced to People, Process Issues
At Interop 2008, panelists said that most SOA efforts will fail, but the issues are with people and processes and not with technology.
Many SOA problems are caused simply by IT and business units not working with each other, or business units refusing to share resources. If you're running a bank, it makes sense for commercial and consumer banking departments to share processes. But end-users may rebel when they're asked to share, according to Howard.
"We can spend a lot of time and energy making all this shared stuff that makes IT more efficient, but it doesn't solve business problems," he said.
A good SOA project requires leadership from a C-level executive who can spur changes in a company's culture, Howard said. "We need to get better at trusting each other as human beings. None of this is really about technology," he said.
Vendors are also contributing to SOA problems. Rebranding old products and claiming they are SOA-compatible is pretty common, Howard said. In fact, it's not in the vendors' interest to have products that are fully compatible with their competitors' technology, he noted.
It's important to remember that "SOA is not a thing," Howard said. "You cannot buy it. It's not shrink-wrapped. It's a state of mind. It's a way of building things."
