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Information Systems Vendor Psychology

IT vendors face a daunting challenge.  Keep their product up to date, making sure research and development doesn't crush revenues, and providing a clear picture of information to a customer that is on information overload. IT vendors experience the "how deep is the pond" syndrome.  Picture all the potential IT customers standing around a pond discussing how deep they think it is, and worried about what potentially lurks below the surface.  Vendors representatives are  life guards.  They are the life guards trying to get the customers to swim.  The problem today is that with a product that experiences a sales cycle of 6-12 months, many "life guards" don't stay around long enough to help you swim. 

Facts:

• All IT vendors can do anything and everything from a technological stand point.  If their system doesn't do it now, they can make it do what ever it is that you need. 
  Rule:  Stick to asking what their system does now, and make notes on what it doesn't do.   Often the best strategy is to email their support with specific questions, and ask for screen shots of the system attribute you are looking for. If they don't have  a screen shot, then it hasn't been done.  

• All IT vendors can make their product interface with existing systems. This is true.  Problem with interfaces is they are usually expensive.  What is an interface?  It is a connection between two different data systems that lets one system know what language the other system speaks.  The interface can also convert the data language into usable form for a differing system.  Often an existing established company seeks to maintain proprietary rights, and territorial rights.  Therefore they will charge a "right of way" fee to the system that wants to talk to theirs.  These fees usually range from $15000-$35,000 per interface.  If they don't grant the right-of-way, it may be because they are trying to develop a comparable product.  Often large IT companies "promise" modules to meet the clients requests, but many times the resulting product isn't as user friendly as a niche vendor.
  Rule:   Obtain interface fees and permissions before installing a new IT system.  One vendor will never have the best of everything, so it will most likely be necessary to piece together the best systems modules available. 

Down time is bad.  Dell service can't be beat for those occasional hardware problems.