The Freedom to Choose

Choice anyone?

Quite frankly, when I'm on the road, my food choices stink. It would be one thing if I had a choice, but often times I don't.

90% of what I'm presented as a "choice" is fast food. Yea I get it, it's fast, it's cheap and it scales, but at what cost to my health? Some fast food joints are trying to do their part, by offering up healthy choices on their menu, but often times, the paying public doesn't buy, confirming again why we have such a dismal choice.

With fewer exceptions than I would like, the average American doesn't reward quality food either. I know, this could be a gross over-generalization, but who am I to argue with the statistics on health and weight in the US?

It's not the same in Europe. Sure, they have fast food, but they also have a vibrant family operated restaurant community. Customers seek these venues out, and reward them with their checkbooks.

So what's this got to do with identity?

Well, simply put, maintaining choice is a choice. You simply cannot take the availability of choice for granted. You have to work for it.

Along those lines, I've noticed a tension (and awareness) within big enterprise recently, and it has everything to do with choice.

To understand the what's going on, you have to understand the players. Essentially, two conflicting agenda's are squaring off. On the one hand, you have IT. When making a purchasing decision, IT typically gravitates towards the best solution. This is the solution that installs quickly, works as promised and lowers their overall risk of failure. Purchasing on the other hand has a different agenda. They like choice too. They like to pit Choice A against Choice B when it comes to price. But, generally speaking, purchasing gives less consideration to the (often hidden) ancillary costs and ramifications of a poor selection. In many cases, purchasing is rewarded differently too, and there is clearly a disconnect as to how the two groups bonuses are calculated and on what.

Accounting for the hidden costs

In IT, more often than not, the real cost isn't from licensing technology. The real costs come from implementing, customizing and operating that technology over a sustained period of time. A 'total' cost to the organization would, if evaluated consistently, move to align IT's recommendations and purchasing, but in my observations, things are rarely that coordinated. Many times, I observe that purchasing would rather keep things simple and the number of vendor relationships they have limited. It makes their job easier, and if they buy more, they get bigger discounts.

Changing times?

So here's where I've noticed the pendulum is swinging away from a bias towards concentrated purchasing from a few large vendors and back again towards more vendor choice and best of breed solutions. Why is this happening? I believe there is an awareness by many enterprises that they do not want all their eggs in a single basket, and they are more than willing to support choice, where they have the option. Add to that the fact that they are being presented with vastly superior offerings by best of breed independent players in certain categories, and having been burned by the dismal landscape of choice over the past 5 years, they are willing to now consider going with the independent player.

Choosing Choice

So here is where some of my recent experiences support what I'm calling as a conscious effort by enterprises to maintain choice. In the past three months, Ping has been asked to participate in a number of executive level meetings. Unlike a year ago, we're being introduced several levels up from where we've normally engaged with enterprises. We're now meeting the boss, the bosses boss and the bosses, bosses, boss.

To me, this says two things. 1. federation is becoming strategic and 2. companies are realizing that they have a new partner in Ping, and they want to look us in the eye.

Many have explicitly stated that they want an independent providing federation technology.

It's a good time to be Ping.