How dependent is your business on one technology provider
Several departments buy different services and believe they have diversified their technology suppliers. A closer look shows that the services rely on the same underlying platform or access provider.
The number of contracts is an incomplete measure of dependence. Leadership needs to understand whether an interruption, commercial dispute or change in service would affect several important business activities at once.
Concentration can bring operational and commercial advantages. The question is whether the organisation understands the resulting exposure and has made an informed choice about it.
Begin with an important business service
Choose a service whose interruption would have a material effect. Trace the systems, information and suppliers it needs, including dependencies shared with other services.
Consider an illustrative customer platform. Its application may be supplied by one company while authentication, hosting and support access depend on others. A backup of the application data alone would not explain how employees and customers could resume using it.
Ask the relevant teams to validate the map and identify uncertainty. Where a provider relies on another party, establish what information and assurance the organisation can reasonably obtain.
Examine different ways the dependency could fail
An outage, a loss of access and a supplier exit create different operational problems. Choose scenarios relevant to the service and examine how the organisation would respond.
Specify the work that could continue, the work that would stop and how long temporary arrangements could be sustained. Check the availability of the people and information required to use those arrangements.
Assess common dependencies in recovery plans. An alternative application may provide little protection if it relies on the same unavailable identity service or if the team cannot obtain the information needed to operate it.
Make exit assumptions testable
Ask how information would be obtained, in which format and with what assistance. Consider contractual arrangements, technical work and the time required to move. The relevant specialists should establish the terms that apply.
An exit plan can involve maintaining the ability to migrate rather than running every service with several providers at once. Management should explain the cost and practicality of its chosen approach.
Test a meaningful part of the plan. Exporting a sample of information and showing that it can be used elsewhere provides better evidence than a statement that portability is supported.
The board should receive the significant concentrations, the business consequences and management's proposed treatment. Any accepted exposure should have an accountable owner and a review point. A decision to retain a concentrated arrangement is easier to defend when the alternatives and their costs have been examined openly.
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