VPEC-T: My Favourite Quotes
“VPEC-T is based on a profoundly radical philosophy of plurality. Instead of a single centralized value system (as found in top-down command-and-control organizations), we expect to find a range of different (overlapping, conflicting) value systems. Instead of a single coherent set of policies, we expect to find the complex interaction between different kinds of policies (commercial, security, safety, corporate responsibility, and so on). Instead of a simple set of routine events, the post-modern organization is faced with a dynamic set of emerging events. Instead of a rigid set of database records, systems content is rich and evolving. And finally, the whole human activity system is underpinned by a complex set of trust relationships between people and organizations”.
– Richard Veryard.
“There is original and very useful thinking underneath the name [VPEC-T] that I think will change the way information systems are developed over time.”
“And just one final point about that name. It’s actually very useful. “VPEC-T” turns out to be a compressed mental checklist that can quickly be played back in your mind in meetings, as you write up the findings of a study or as you discuss the information system ‘to be’”.
– Roy Grub.
“This is a genuinely different way of looking at information systems. Much of architecture and requirements analysis is focussed on the “how” rather than the “what”. This book redresses the balance and provides a novel way of understanding how people and organisations interact and what information systems need to do”.
– Simon Tait.
“A simple and elegant approach to allow people who happen to be building IT architectures, to talk meaningfully with the business people who are paying for it. It’s a new way to (begin to) fix an old problem. An IT architecture that ignores people will be both complex and unworkable. VPECT encourages people to type discussions around trust and values in a way that architecture frameworks ignore. An excellent tool, whose application is underestimated by its authors in areas way outside of IT architectures”.
– Peter Drivers.
“I’ve used VPEC-T as an internal approach to driving questions and conversations as opposed to ‘throwing it on the table’ – my thoughts are that asking people to think hard about their business problems etc is enough to ask without the cognitive burden of a framework (no matter how simple!). But then being an employee as opposed to a consultant means that the discussions tend to be looser, shorter and less formal than it might be as an outside consultant”.
– Mike Burke.
“Overall it was a great way of describing the business context we were operating in and gave us a solid foundation to start requirements analysis and architecture from. Certainly, we were better served by the output of this analysis than we would have been with a list of affected IT systems, or current state processes”.
– Doug Newdick.
“The most important part for me was the VT. It allowed for better conversations with clients and other stakeholders through refining my understanding of the context, relevance, responsiveness, timeliness and other business level ilities. This allowed distilling a better architecture once lensing through PEC which I see very much as technology level concerns.
It’s a very useful thinking framework to focus on actual value. It is very effective at nurturing sustainable productivity and works very effectively when combined with data-driven analysis”.
– Darach Ennis.
“Trust is the cornerstone of all relationships and must be firmly established in order to ensure any exchange of dialogue. It is the most difficult element to obtain, yet it is the single most important element in the [VPEC-T] model. Trust is best established by keeping one’s word and completing the actions for which you have committed (‘doing what you say you will do’). Often, participants in a project will have a positive/negative trust reputation that must be understood as part of the communications process. Ways to establish and maintain credibility (trust) with other parties include transparency of purpose and full disclosure of goals and expectations (no ‘hidden’ agendas)”.
– James Kuhn.
Twitter tag: #vpect
Please take a look at the work-in-progress VPEC-T Metro Map.
