I have a client where their current production lockdown is moving from 3 months to 5 months. Anyone out there have a longer lock down duration for Essbase?

That leaves roughly 7 months whereby essbase can be modified to meet the users budgeting / allocation / reporting requirements. I guess that's still at least half a year where production changes can be made. I just need to line up my customers by when their lock down periods are open.

I've battled sox auditors in the past and prevailed.
Battling IT is a different story.

What other outlandish IT rules have you seen applied to Essbase that all but make it unusable?

I had one IT manager try to tell me they would need a 5 hour overnight window to backup 10 gig........ That would have left me with 2 hours for my nightly processing.

The stuff business guys do to derail a project can't really be categorized other than to say they keep changing their mind....



hj

I guess it depends on what is considered a "lock down" but I would argue the individuals making those rules, don't understand what Essbase is or rather what it's proper use and role in an organization is.

They hear the word "database" and they assume one thing, when in fact it is something quite different.

Gary,

I deeply regretted not being able to attend your "Politics of Essbase" session at Kaleidoscope -- what the OP (oooh, a joke, Organizational Psychology, OP, I scare myself. :) Yes, I took a couple of courses too, and yes, it helps a *lot* in understanding the workplace.) states sounds right up that presentation's alley.

Yes, IT doesn't get it. Essbase isn't a giant DW. That's the whole point, right? DW's are monsters -- powerful, and, once implemented, little changed, or at least not casually. Essbase's raison d'etre is to be nimble, fast, and responsive to business user needs (even if they have a hard time time expressing their needs -- this is what IT -- and I come from IT -- has a really hard time understanding).

The only IT departments that I've run across that get Essbase are always labelled "Finance IT" or "FIS" or something like that where they are tightly tied to their business' needs. And ultimately report to a business owner, not the CIO (maybe a dotted line relationship, but never more than that).

This isn't to damn IT departments -- I've run across more than a few that are outstanding -- just that to them Essbase is one more arrow in a quiver of many tools whereas a Finance IT group has just a few (ERP, Essbase, and often just a handful of other products). I guess it's a question of focus.

Sorry for the pontificating -- I get pretty worked up over this one.

Regards,

Cameron Lackpour