Applications are like puppies!

As I talked about in another blog post (Hoarding: an organizational phenomenon), hoarding applications can lead to an overwhelming and oppressive IT environment for the staff and the organization.

I like analogies. Buying an application is a lot like owning a puppy to people who have never owned a puppy before.

1. Everyone loves looking at a puppy (just like the business thinking about buying an application).
2. Everyone loves looking at the puppy do things (or for applications, capabilities and demos).
3. Everyone imagines having a puppy being full of Frisbee and cuddle time (or for applications, the business operating like a scene out of The Coca-Cola Happiness Factory).
4. At this point, everyone that wants a puppy agrees that it would be great to own a puppy. I mean, look at that picture! Isn't that puppy cute? How could you not want a puppy!?

Committing to a puppy is only a short term engagement. A puppy is only a puppy for a year, maybe. The reality is that you're truly commit to the full life cycle of a canine. Not only is your puppy a puppy, it will absolutely become a dog. It is inevitable. 

Applications have a similar life cycle. Commit to a puppy of application, when it is all cute and funny, you are also committing to the dog of an application, where you need to clean up after it and take it to the vet regularly, like  pay maintenance and for upkeep, including security updates. And...eventually, the dog becomes old and you'll need to put it down, just like old applications.

See, applications are like puppies!

Chris

photo credit: Roozbeh Rokni via photopin cc