Monday, August 27, 2012

Alienated from Users

For the past few years I had been working on design and upgrade projects which were well documented from a requirement's and functional perspective. My tasks were to work out the technical aspects of the solution. I read the requirements and specs and got about 70 to 80% of the context of the project. In this case the project was to upgrade an integrated pharma based DCTM system from 5.3 to 6.5sp3.



This alone was no small task. I was heads down in WDK weeds for weeks. After hashing out all of the version differences in the customizations and performing the upgrade, I realized that I really had no idea what the content was, what lab techs did with it, or marketing, or really anyone. I just helped with technical aspects and went on my way. However, a bad after taste after the project made me think about what motivates me to help big pharma, big finance? Why am I facilitating these large greedy companies and their investors to become more efficient at making more money?

This guilt shows in how DCTM labors along at these large installations. There is a malaise in the program management of EMC projects. The clients are going along with it, but in more and more cases bailing to SharePoint because the client can have more control and pay less money (at least in the near term). Who are these clients, these Users? What problems are they trying solve? Why do they put up with shitty UIs? Adolescent configuration tools? Complex integration methods?

How did pharma get so caught up with complex 21 CFR procedures when most of them self police any possible audits anyways? IT in these places are a house of cards, but fortunately no one is a whistle blower, yet. All this made me alienated from DCTM, it's big installs, and especially sequestered Users.

I am now working with Hyland OnBase in the healthcare industry, which is a breath of fresh air. Come back for comparisons between OnBase and Documentum.