Fundamentals of Metadata Management

Chapter 8. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Implementing technology in a company takes three types of groups:

• Employees

• Consultants

• Software vendors

Employees in companies are often tasked with finding technological answers to business problems with the help of metadata repositories. However, after having identified the desired software, companies often find themselves lacking the technological understanding and maybe even the subject matter expertise to implement the given metadata repository. The technology vendor will most likely have a customer success team, which—as the name indicates—will help the customer be successful after the sales team has won the client and signed a deal. But in most cases, the technology vendor will not offer dedicated implementation projects, even though the customer may be in need of those. Enter the technology consultant: companies hire consultants to help them implement technology because the companies need help with doing this and the vendors of software are focused on creating software—not implementing it.

Anyone who has been an employee, a consultant, or a software vendor in this constellation knows that it is a very special situation of high psychological intensity, time pressure, and technological challenges. This chapter provides a brief sociological analysis¹ of the interactions among the employee, the consultant, and the software vendor when assessing and implementing metadata repositories in companies.

Tip

If you hold a leadership ...