[Software] What Kind Of Enterprise Software Will Be Right For Your Business In The Future?

[#Drennn.]

Think for a moment about how organizations are evolving. They all want to be lean, fast and specialized. They're trying to become more adaptable, intelligent and resilient. Wherever you look, it's a pretty consistent pattern.

Now, think about the main trends in enterprise software. It seems to be evolving in 20 directions at once: AI, ML, SaaS, PaaS—it feels like you're drowning in alphabet soup. Even when you spot a recognizable word like "cloud," there are half a dozen different flavors.

How can you make sense of it all? Software buyers need to understand all the factors, decide which matter most and check that the software they're considering has them. I've included a checklist below to help you do this.

For me, though, as CTO of an enterprise software company, it's slightly different. I have to understand all of these options in order to decide which way to steer our software development program. In this article, I'm sharing what I've decided to do for my purposes in the hope that it will help you make software choices that are right for your business.

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How Is Enterprise Software Evolving?

In my mind, there are five categories of trends in enterprise software.

1. Platform trends. Enterprise software is moving to the cloud for reasons of accessibility, resilience and scalability. The trend is also to distribute different parts of the software across multiple locations (data center, public cloud and user devices).

Vendors are building software out of ready-made blocks of functionality called microservices and allowing them to interact with other software using universal connectors called APIs. They're also breaking down huge software suites into task-specific chunks that just give the user what they need to do their job.

2. Trends in intelligence. Business software firms are increasingly using AI to improve user experience by automating repetitive processes and spotting patterns in how users behave in order to plan improvements to the software. AI can also automatically create little bits of contextually relevant software in the moment to capture missing information, for example.

Vendors are also introducing natural language interfaces into their software. A Constellation Research report confirms that "customers expect the ability to use voice as an interface as much as they use touch and gestures."

3. The software ecosystem. Enterprise software normally comes as a suite that covers all the main business functions like finance, people, purchasing and project management. These days, people want their enterprise software to work with (and be as easy to use as) major collaboration platforms like Teams or Slack.

Increasingly, vendors are offering industry-specific software, with industry best practices encoded into ready-to-use modules. The Constellation Research report points out that "customers expect their cloud-based ERP solution to deliver on deep industry vertical functionality."

4. Extensibility. Many industries still use specialist software, like the fundraising systems found in the nonprofit sector, and enterprise software needs to be easily extensible to such systems. The Constellation report adds that "customers also expect their ERP vendor to provide integration support for adjacent solutions in the ecosystem.”

Despite all the vendors' efforts to make their standard products as customized as possible, some organizations still need to develop their own bespoke applications on top of the vendors' platforms. Vendors need to provide extension toolkits to enable them to do this.

5. Business issues. Beyond industry specialization, some enterprise software vendors are also specializing in providing organizations of a particular size with software that is neither too simplistic nor overly complex for their level of maturity.

Last, but certainly not least, software buyers are placing more importance on the cultural fit between their organizations and the software vendor. Some peer review sites even produce rankings on the "emotional footprint" of ERP vendors.

The Enterprise Software Buyer's 11-Point Checklist

Here's my advice for what to look for in enterprise software to help ensure it will be right for your business in the future.

1. Can you place the software wherever you like (on-premise, in private and public clouds or at the edge)?

2. Does it have a modular structure? Is it built from microservices and connected via APIs?

3. Does it offer task-specific apps that people can put on their mobile devices?

4. Does it include AI to automate mundane tasks and continuously improve user experience?

5. Can you talk to it in natural language?

6. Does it come as part of an integrated suite of software that handles all the main business functions?

7. Can you easily connect it to other business software that you use in your industry?

8. Does it work with major collaboration platforms like Teams or Slack, and does it feel as intuitive to use?

9. Is it tailored to your industry sector, and does it come with industry-specific business processes out of the box?

10. Is the software the "right size" for your business—not too big and not too small?

11. And don't underestimate this one: Is there a good cultural fit between your organization and the vendor?

Predicting the future has never been easy; these days, it's virtually impossible. The only way to prepare for it is to be prepared for anything. That means having the flexibility to change quickly, cheaply and easily. In the end, the sort of enterprise software that'll be right for your business in the future is probably the sort that's most easily adaptable.