Thanks for your comments my article.

Regarding the issue of IT involved. The GP approach doesn't keep IT away from the whole process - only the initial sessions where we are obtaining a common vision from the business stakeholders about what the problem is that is being solved. The intent behind keeping IT out of the initial facilitated sessions is to let the business stakeholders become aligned on the problem that is being solved, before trying to find solutions to the problem.

Once a common vision of the problem is established, then the IT Architect is very involved in providing clear metrics around delivering the requested functionality and what options are available to deliver the requested functionality. There are often several options with widely varying degrees of difficulty. By partnering with the business stakeholders and discussing delivery in terms of business functionality, we are able to reach mutual understanding between IT and the business on what and when functionality is delivered. This process has worked very successfully for us on a number of projects.

This process only takes about 3-4 weeks to establish the width of the project (i.e., scope) and the business functionality to be delivered and when it is to be delivered. The metrics that we use then allow us to adjust the plan as functionality is delivered. And, change management is done in terms of adding, modifying or removing business functionality in terms of the defined scenarios.

For more information, please try to access our site again - I am not sure why you are having difficulty. If you continue to have issues please let me know.

Cathy Brunsting
Lead Business Analyst, Geneca
Chicagoland IIBA Chapter President