Theory versus Reality – is “less” becoming “more?”

IT organizations and leadership are faced with a myriad of complexities due to the nature of the modern business environment. This complex world was highlighted in an article from CIO Magazine titled Has IT become too complex to manage? In light of this complexity, we see a movement toward simplicity and business outcomes. There is a trade-off between what companies think they want and need versus what they realistically can accomplish.

The roots of Coras date back 14 years when the company started as CorasWorks. Our platform sat on top of Microsoft SharePoint, leveraging its tremendous functionality, and provided a host of its own powerful features. With hundreds of configuration options in CorasWorks, and thousands more in SharePoint, some considered that to be the ultimate in flexibility. While true in one respect, the very choices enabling that flexibility brought its own level of complexity.

Complexity isn’t unique to platforms; we see it in everyday applications, too. Project Portfolio Management tools have ballooned into complex systems, bloated with features that sound good in theory, but in reality make your head hurt. The results are convoluted user experiences, requiring significant training and discipline to provide meaningful data – data needed for the very management insights for which the solution exists. With garbage in, or even missing data (not in), the result is garbage out – incomplete or inaccurate reporting and updates. Or even worse, we end up with project managers spending valuable time chasing down updates, sifting through emails, and cobbling together spreadsheets. And by the time they do it, everything has changed. Uggh.

Fast forward to today, Coras has learned from the lessons of the past. We have folded those lessons into our CorasManage solution for project and portfolio management. Our focus is on the user experience: get users where they need to be, doing what they need to do, with speed and ease. As such, the tool is genuinely a solution and not a burden. It captures the necessary information and reporting so you can effectively manage projects and portfolios. So, stop wasting time with complexity. Simplify and get on to the other activities you have.