The "Shop Talk" column is concerned with all things technology-vendor related: how to organize and execute a vendor search, how to negotiate a good deal, and how to implement third-party software. In the first few articles of this series, we have looked at some aspects of the search phase. In this issue, I'd like to leap forward in time to the point where we need to organize the implementation–where the search "rubber" meets the deliverables "road."

Previous columns have emphasized the need for a search methodology. But what about an implementation methodology? First, let's clear one major stumbling block out of the way. Implementing third-party software is not the same as building software. So, development methodologies, those commercially available methodologies that work well for building, are not generally well suited to organizing the implementation of third-party software. Then where do we look to find a viable framework to help organize the effort? The software vendor usually has an implementation methodology. But let the buyer beware, as vendor methodologies often are little more than window dressing; may not be available to clients; and almost certainly are restricted to the vendor side of the implementation, ignoring much of the integration, quality assurance, and testing, and leaving these critical implementation issues to the carrier.

Aside from the vendor's implementation methodology, another option is to reuse parts of the time-tested, in-house, generic project methodology for individual parts of the overall implementation. However, with this alternate approach, it is critical to understand such an undertaking is not a "project" but a series of interrelated projects more appropriately thought of as a "program."