{"id":44,"date":"2006-07-28T12:05:01","date_gmt":"2006-07-28T20:05:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/?p=44"},"modified":"2006-07-28T12:05:01","modified_gmt":"2006-07-28T20:05:01","slug":"best-of-breed-or-best-of-mediocrity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/best-of-breed-or-best-of-mediocrity\/","title":{"rendered":"Best of Breed, or Best of Mediocrity?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nHaving worked for some time as a software engineer in the enterprise security
\nsoftware world, I know that customers (enterprises) look for “best of breed”
\nsoftware. For a large company customer, this usually means that a software
\nsolution distinguishes itself in some way that makes it work well in their
\nenvironment. Often, this translates to reliability, cross-platform support,
\nperson-to-person support and the ability to function beyond what is advertised.\n<\/p>\n

As many are aware, there is “consolidation” going on in the security market<\/a>.
\nBig fish are swallowing smaller fish, and it’s lucrative, in the short term,
\nfor everyone except customers. Supposedly, the consolidation means that two
\nseparate products can be “integrated”, or unified. Never mind the previous
\ncompetitive relationship that may have existed between the product teams and
\ntheir management. For some reason, people seem to think that competition
\nevaporates and that the two product teams will happily work together to build
\nthe next generation “Best of Breed” software solution.\n<\/p>\n

Not so.\n<\/p>\n

In any big corporation or software company, there are constant power plays
\nbeing made. You could call this “decision making”, and if you have uncommonly
\ngood leaders, you might even say good<\/em> decisions are being made.
\nUnfortunately, it is human nature for most people to misuse and abuse positions
\nof power. Instead of making product decisions that are best for their merged
\ncustomer base, they make decisions that keep themselves in a position of power.\n<\/p>\n

So, we have two best of breed products: Overdog and Underdog. Underdog is
\neasier to manage, but isn’t as complete in its offerings. Overdog is more
\ncomplete, but is more expensive to deploy and manage. Overdog has the advantage
\nof being used in Fortune 500 companies. Underdog, on the other hand, is trying
\nto break into that market space.\n<\/p>\n

Enter Big Fish — a.k.a. Consolidator. Consolidator buys Overdog, and a few
\nyears later, buys Underdog. We take two products, both “Best of Breed” in
\ndifferent ways, and expect to see them merged together to make something “next
\ngeneration” — better, faster, stronger, and easier to use.\n<\/p>\n

Whenever there is a consolidation, talented people get fired, and their
\ncreative ideas and abilities are lost. Product integration never<\/em> happens as
\neasily as anyone would like to believe (if it happens at all). And in the end, customers end up with a
\nproduct that we can best label as “Best of Mediocrity”. Consolidation means
\nthat customers lose their “Best of Breed” solutions.\n<\/p>\n

What can you expect from Software Consolidators? Mediocre solutions. Look
\nelsewhere for excellence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Having worked for some time as a software engineer in the enterprise security software world, I know that customers (enterprises) look for “best of breed” software. For a large company customer, this usually means that a software solution distinguishes itself in some way that makes it work well in their environment. Often, this translates to … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Best of Breed, or Best of Mediocrity?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,16,17,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-programming","category-security","category-tech","category-work"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jaredrobinson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}