Moving On from Win2K and Being Intelligently Agile

I've recently noticed that the .NET Framework Version 3.0 (which is currently in the late beta stage) is unlikely to run on anything earlier than Windows XP SP2.

The likely consequence of this is that some software developed over the next couple of years will not run on Windows 2000. This is probably early notice to business to move on from Windows 2000.

I suspect that at least part of the reason that the next version of the framework will not run on anything earlier is simply that Microsoft does not want corporates to hang on to Windows 2000 in the same way they managed to hang onto Windows NT.

This touches on a theme that I think is becoming increasingly important: platform stability. The problem for IT professionals generally is reconciling the speed at which new technology becomes available with becoming sufficiently experienced with it to provide genuine value to the business that pays for it.

Although new technology can and does provide competitive advantage, continually changing and upgrading the entire system can be draining and lead to costly mistakes.

There is no doubt that business IT needs to be continually moving forward, but it must do so smoothly. Sudden, seismic changes can be very damaging and I believe generally should be avoided.

I say generally very cautiously though because I am acutely aware that discontinuous change is a huge source of competitive advantage. The art is spotting which big changes will deliver the biggest blows to the competitors and then implementing them.

However, the fact remains that simply pursuing all change can exhaust an organisation. The most successful organisations are probably those that have sufficient elasticity to absorb the competitively important changes quickly while remaining intelligent about those options which they pursue. It’s just another aspect of being agile. The important point here, though, is to be intelligently agile.