These days, you can find an application to manage most business tasks and processes. From help desk applications to CRM to mobile payment apps and inventory management, this huge array of applications has seen many organisations stray from their goal of trying to have integrated or  singular master system(s) in order to run their business and keep up with data demands and legislation.  

We’ve spoken at length in a previous blog about how and why application sprawl is becoming an overwhelming problem for a lot of organisations. But, once you’ve decided on a course of action to tackle this issue (such as an applications review), it’s important to have a consistent set of criteria to compare this mass of applications and judge their relevance. 

At CoStratify, we use a comprehensive 12-point application measurement criteria to ensure that every application in your system is working to its fullest potential within your organisation (if you’d like to find out more about this service, please get in touch).  

When carrying out an application review within your own organisation, however, there are 3 essential criteria you don't want to forget when judging a business application's relevance… 

Purchased Capabilities Used  

Is this application capable of carrying out your desired processes or producing your desired outcomes? Are you currently using the application to its fullest potential? And, can it be integrated with other applications in your organisation or are there any additional in app purchases or ‘bolt-ons' that can help to fulfil the job of other applications you are looking to rationalise? 

One of the most common reasons we see for application sprawl is that the organisation is not aware of the applications they have and what they are capable of doing. When carrying out a review, it’s so important to not only look at what functions the application is carrying out now, but also what it’s capable of doing that’s not currently being taken advantage of. 

Technical Complexity  

How easy is this application to use and does it produce useful and relevant data? Does this application perform a similar function to any other application in your organisation? How many other applications and systems is this one application reliant upon?  

The more technically complex your network of applications is, the more challenging innovation within your organisation becomes. With a mass sprawl of applications, it can not only be more challenging to identify potential opportunities for change, but it also becomes more complex to implement strategic changes as changes to one application don’t always automatically update in linked applications. Mapping and understanding how each application does and can work within your current setup is an important step when judging an application's relevance and documenting it is critical.   

Data Quality & Control  

How complete, relevant, useful and accurate is the data each application is producing and holding for your current business practices? Is this data duplicated or available in any other applications you have within your network? Is this data secure and protected? Do users have to extract data from the system to spreadsheets to enable them to do their job?  

Every business application you have should have a role, users know what it is used for and be collecting valuable information to help inform your decision making within the organisation. This ensures that every change you are looking to implement is strategic and aligned with the businesses aims and objectives in order to get great results.  

Undertaking a full business applications review can be a task that just seems too big to start, especially if the number of active applications within your organisation is in the hundreds or even thousands. If you're feeling swamped with business applications and think that it’s time for an application review, get in touch to find out more about our 12-point application measurement criteria and how we can help.