B2B Data Integration and Transformation Blog

It’s that time of the year once again where people start thinking about their taxes. Not a pleasant activity but a necessary one. This brings to mind an annual event that my client undertakes but in my opinion is like doing your taxes, not a whole lot of fun. I’m talking about the annual disaster recovery test (DRT).

For those of you that have ever been part of a DRT you know what I mean! It’s a process that may seem like a waste of time if it never gets used but well worth the time if you do need to execute it.

When Remedi started as a business twenty years ago, our focus was solely on EDI - integrating data from/to a trading partner from/to a company's business software. EDI software basically did what data integration software does today, but on a limited basis and it was strictly business-to-business. As companies began choosing software packages instead of developing applications in-house, the need for internal data integration grew and software developers answered the need with, what was then called, middleware. These days integration software satisfies the needs of business-to-business and application-to-application data exchange.

Having contingency plans and redundancy in business is key to ensuring you have the inputs, production, and delivery mechanisms necessary to satify customer product or service demands.  This holds true for businesses of all sizes and reach, local or global.  The bigger the reach, or more complex the business, the more critical having these plans become. 

This also holds true for the business, data, and EDI integration responsibilities we have to our organizations.

In a recent article that has been circulating from Forbes.com, How Far $100 Goes In Each State And Major Metropolitan Area, I was surprised to see the differences in the value of our “buck” state to state.  Of course some things are more expensive in some areas, like Hawaii where everything has to be shipped in by boat, but what makes the value of your buck worth so much more in Ohio vs Pennsylvania when they are neighboring states? 

After reading this article, it occurred to me that this same thing happens in the B2B Integration/EDI Consulting world.  When you are faced with staffing issues or project work that needs done, are you getting the most bang for your buck?

The weather looks great for this weekend, so my wife Amy and I will ‘slip the surly bonds of earth’ in a small private airplane for a summer holiday visit with family a few hundred miles to our south.   And though we will arrive at the same destination, at the same time, in the same aircraft, if you ask each of us about our trip you will find we’ve taken two very different journeys to get there.