Joseph Hinkle at MyITForum.com

I've spent the better part of two weeks learning more than I ever wanted to know about Microsoft's Enterprise Agreement. As it turns out, there are quite a parts that have poor or little explanation on the Microsoft website. There are a few things I focused on, like Software Assurance, the desktop platform, and the CAL suites.

I originally intended this post to impart the wisdom gleaned from two weeks with the beast, but I decided to ditch that idea. I could blog about it for a while, but how productive would that be? Instead, I think I will share my mistakes with you.

Mistake 1: Scope creep. We went into this process with a couple of specific goals. We wanted to consolidate our Microsoft purchases to take advantage of all of our spending power. We are currently under a Select agreement, but we figured the EA would be more cost effective. Unfortunately, we decided we should try to replace an entire enterprise-worth of software in one fell swoop. The end result is a whirlwind tour of every product Microsoft has even thought about releasing. It it too much to look at and impossible to build a business case for.

Mistake 2: Overcomplicating the simple things. We have typically purchased Office Standard or Pro, depending on the user. The end result is something that requires a serious purchasing process to handle. The cost savings is lost in Access purchases for people who decide they need it later and the manpower to manage a clunky process. Interesting fact: it only takes about 30% of the Standard users to decide that they need Access to negate all of that cost savings. Plan farther ahead.

Mistake 3: Building a business case after the fact. We ended up in a situation that left us unable to prove we needed what we knew we needed. Why? We didn't think about how we could justify the individual pieces. If justification can't be found for a couple of the key components, the whole proposal will fail. Ask those questions up front.

Mistake 4: You can't do it all on your own. If everyone in the process isn't committed to it, it will fail.

The funny thing is that I'm not even close to done. I'm sure I'll see even more mistakes later on, but that should be enough for installment one. The most important thing is to find out where your company really stands currently and where it wants to be. If you don't have those two facts, the process is doomed to wander around in the wilderness.