Against Medical Advice (AMA) is an established medical term, which basically warns the patient (customer) that he or she is acting against professional advice. In the online industry, it is common for customers to have their own peculiar way of doing things, often against the advice of peers, vendor, analysts, consultants and anybody else. Unfortunately, vendors or consultants very rarely tell their customers that they are on the wrong track and about to act against explicit advice previously given; instead they tend to simply continue sending their invoices.
Here’s some details on AMA according to the Canadian Medical Association:
Patients who leave hospital against medical advice (AMA) may be at risk of adverse health outcomes and readmission [...] Patients who left AMA were much more likely than the control patients to be readmitted within 15 days
I understand very well that advice from a doctor rates much higher than that of a vendor or consultant working in the young online industry. They are certainly much better educated than most, including yours truly. There’s also a noteworthy difference between acting on your own health vs. acting on behalf of your organisation. Finally, with many issues in the online industry there simply is no definite right or wrong.
Having said all of that, I would urge you to consider the following examples and best practice advice which we often share when we assist enterprises with selecting a new CMS:
- Use a short tender, ideally with less than 10 evaluation criteria and on less than 10 pages
- Don’t just select a CMS. Select a system integrator with it. Even if you plan on doing many things yourself and on building your own skills, you still need to ensure that there is somebody available to assist and support you.
- Don’t ask for a proposal for the entire implementation, which you can’t specify in sufficient detail any way. Instead you should ask for a proposal for an initial scoping exercise and then take the project and relationship from there.
If you don’t follow the above, here are some of the inevitable consequences:
- An unnecessarily long tender will lead to very long proposals and may ultimately push you into buying an overly complex and expensive system
- Even if you find the perfect CMS, it is of little use if there is nobody nearby to help you make best use of it. Flying consultants in from abroad is expensive and you are also likely to experience a first-mover disadvantage if you are amongst the first customers with your specific requirements or in your geographic region.
- If you try to get proposals and a price quote for the entire implementation, the bids will vary enormously in both price and quality as there will be many uncertainties. You are likely to end up paying far more than the market price as bidders will try to get a premium price to compensate for the risk.
On this blog we’ve already shared good advice for many other areas as well, including intranets, web project management, strategy, usability and communication. However, I know that customers do not always agree.
Have you recently acted against an expert opinion? Why did you do it?
Lokesh May 27th, 2009 10:05
Nice post Janus.
Adding to “Don’t just select a CMS. Select a system integrator with it”. I think if an IT educated customer already made up its mind then it is advisable for the customers to do background check if the service providers really have the expertise and experience in a particular CMS. Valid case studies in the proposal are one such way of knowing this.
Agreed, scoping exercise is very much essential. If the customer has few existing products, which they want to be integrated with, then it should be clearly communicated in the tender and customer should ask for some technical proof if the integration works. Be it a proof of concept or an assurance from the product vendor.
Ben Morris May 28th, 2009 10:05
Good stuff. Love the AMA metaphor.
Some customers become obsessed with a forensic examination of platform functionality during the tender process, when the question of whether or not you trust the software vendor and the implementation partner is just as important as the CMS platform.
The short tender approach is interesting. I do find that many tenders turn into an extended “check-list”, listing every conceivable functional requirement without any prioritisation. This isn’t effective as every CMS vendor has some means of addressing checkpoint-style questions. A lot of tenders could be condensed down to a few key areas with an emphasis on “how” functionality can be delivered rather than “if” functionality is supported.
Jon Marks May 28th, 2009 10:05
Oh, how I wish the prospects I worked with followed this advice. Sadly, we seem to be dealing with quite a few Do-It-Yourself Brain Surgeons that don’t listen to the expert advise.
Can I add another one which might be controversial – give an idea of your budget. Just a broad range will do, but it helps the vendor/SI tailor the solution. Imaging walking into an estate agent and having this conversation:
You: “I want a house”
Estate Agent: “Excellent. Any locations in mind? How many bedrooms? Are schools important? Near public transport?”
You: “Yeah, they’re all important. The more bedrooms the better”
Estate Agent: “Okay, we’ll do a broad search. What kind of budget do you have?”
You: “Now that would be telling. But make sure you give me the best price you can on the house you pick for me”.
Sounds a bit ridiculous to me …
Janus Boye May 31st, 2009 10:05
Hey Jon,
I understand why, as a systems integrator, you would like an indication of budget. If the market was a bit more mature, I would agree with you, but in the current marketplace, I normally advice customers against it as it might make it less likely to get very attractive proposals.
There is an exception to be made for those government organisations that need to know whether the project costs will require a formal national or even European Union tender. In that case it is advisable to indicate and require costs to stay below the limits.
Here’s an updated transcript of your estate agent conversation with a subtle change to only the final sentence:
You: “I want a house”
Estate Agent: “Excellent. Any locations in mind? How many bedrooms? Are schools important? Near public transport?”
You: “Yeah, they’re all important. The more bedrooms the better”
Estate Agent: “Okay, we’ll do a broad search. What kind of budget do you have?”
You: “Now that would be telling. Can you instead tell me what price range you can offer?”.
Sounds fair enough to me, in particular if the buyer wants to compare estate agents.
Jon Marks May 31st, 2009 10:05
Fair enough, Mr Janus-As-House-Buyer,
Seeing this is London, we can offer you a n nice broad price range. We can offer you a grotty little one-bedroom in the middle of nowhere for about £50K. Or we can get you a mansion on Hyde Park for about £50 million. However, seeIng I’ve got 10 pages in my RFP response, I’ll also squeeze in an option for a two bedroom flat that is fairly central for £500K and this lovely large family home in Zone 1 for £5 million. Hope that helps. I’ve covered 4 orders of magnitude of budget for you. I hope I’ve come out cheaper than the other estate agents.
I am assuming that only one of these houses if vaguely close to what you had in mind. Oh how I wish you’d told me you had a ballpark budget of between £300K and £800K. It could have saved us both a lot of time and effort ….
» Why are RFPs always so long? - J. Boye » Blog August 10th, 2009 10:05
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