Sorry To Tell You - SOA is All About Networking!

The True Value in SOA may be in your ability to Build, Expose and have your Services Consumed by Trusted Partners before your Competitor Does.

While you are focused on building an Enterprise SOA, the real value may be in becoming the first and best purveyor of services with your trusted partners.  Influencing your partners to share your services so you can build better business processes and enabling them to build better business processes may endear them to you for a long time, if not forever.  Building and sharing better services may provide you with a competitive advantage; at least in the short term.  So while many companies are staring at their belly buttons, keep in mind the tipping point could be in your ability to influence your partners that you have the best services.  Building the community of interest around your enterprise and its processes will actually allow you to extend your organization to a “Service-Oriented Community” of interest.

Don’t get Hung-Up on SOA for Enterprise Integration only

Although, many enterprises are focused on using SOA for integration within their enterprise, keep in mind the “Three Stages of SOA” and the larger vision it has to offer: (see my blog: http://soanetworkarchitect.com/2006/04/28/evolution-to-serviceoriented-communities-serviceoriented-economy-and-the-semantic-web.aspx )

It is easy to get hung-up trialing web services within your enterprise, trying to figure out the value SOA brings, and it’s associated ROI.  It’s easy to sit back and wait for the right conditions under which to adopt SOA and their associated standards - should I wait and see how things play out, wait until the right standards are in place, etc., etc.  On the other hand many enterprises are vigorously embracing the development of SOA and deploying services as fast as they can.  These enterprises see the bigger picture and are early adopters, realizing the true value lies beyond their immediate enterprise and their ability to build and maintain relationships with their community of interest.  For many there is a Sense of Urgency in building SOA Hubs and SOA Networks!

The true value in SOA may be in the experience your Enterprise gains by taking the lead beyond your immediate Enterprise!

Many enterprises are short sighted and conservative in the adoption of SOA and don’t see any sense of urgency.  You need to look beyond you immediate enterprise to see the true value in what SOA brings.

SOA is all about Interoperability and Networking!

SOA Network Effect

What is the SOA network effect? 

Eric Marks is president and CEO of AgilePath Corporation wrote about this SOA Network Effect, where he sees:

“the value of the SOA increases as the number of available services and the number of users using those services increases.  This benefit compounds over time as the SOA is leveraged internally and externally.  SOA’s demonstrate increasing returns in this fashion.”

For more information see his article in ComputerWorld:

The SOA Network Effect: Technical and Cultural Issues Drive Value  http://www.computerworld.com/developmenttopics/development/story/0,10801,95258,00.html

While many vendors are pushing security and governance as a way to help you justify your SOA development, keep in mind the larger vision of SOA.  Creating a sense of urgency around the need to expose your best shared services first in order to propagate these services throughout your sphere of influence; might be the extra incentive and justification you need to move forward quickly.

Service-Oriented Architecture has the potential to forever change how we view boundaryless enterprises in the future, as we move to  “Service-Oriented Communities” and a “Service-Oriented Economy”. 

 

See Recent Update to this blog: 

What does Networking have to do with Governance?

http://soanetworkarchitect.com/2006/09/11/what-does-networking-have-to-do-with-governance.aspx