Data Migration Survey 2011

I have already reported on some of the preliminary results of this year’s data migration survey. The snippets that I reported previously remain unchanged in tone, though a few of the figures are slightly different. Readers may also be aware that we have published a paper on data migration best practices in conjunction with SAP Business Objects, although I cannot find it on the SAP site or I would have posted a link. However, this too was based on the preliminary results only and detailed analysis has meant that we have been able to tease out some additional findings.

The most interesting thing from the final results is that we have been able to identify seven critical success factors and, although one of these was only qualitative (perhaps we’ll be able to quantify it next time), we did find six metrics that we could quantify. Putting these six together and implementing all of them results in a cost saving of an average of $170,000 per project. And since the average respondent was running half a dozen such projects per year, that’s a potential saving of over $1m per annum. And that doesn’t include indirect business costs that you might save that may result from overrunning or cancelled projects such as late product introductions, delayed revenue recognition or customer dissatisfaction and attrition.

So, what are these critical success factors? Well, some of them pertain to the use of tools and some of them are more organisational but you’ll have to download the full report to find out in detail. I figure that whatever we charge for the report will be a drop in the ocean compared to the savings you’ll make. I will say that everybody involved with data migration should read this: tools vendors, systems integrators, consultants and users. Even if you are a user company that intends to outsource the entire project to a third party you need to read this because there is one best practice that directly relates to this scenario. Moreover, this is entirely aside from how you select your outsourcer in the first place, to which the other success factors will apply.

Anyway, so much for the advertorial.