{"id":9009,"date":"2015-03-31T10:00:45","date_gmt":"2015-03-31T15:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/?p=9009"},"modified":"2022-11-22T16:01:38","modified_gmt":"2022-11-22T22:01:38","slug":"whats-the-true-cost-of-your-legacy-applications","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/2015\/03\/whats-the-true-cost-of-your-legacy-applications\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s the true cost of your legacy applications?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Education\"Summary: Many businesses still run on legacy applications. Is your business one of them? If so, how much are these legacy applications costing your company? It might be more than you think. Here are 7 ways legacy applications can hurt the bottom line. <\/em><\/span>
\n<\/a>
\n

\"photo
photo credit: jurvetson<\/a> via photopin<\/a> cc<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/p>\n

Many businesses across the globe still run their operations on legacy systems and applications. Some still run on software created 20-30 years ago. <\/p>\n

Why don\u2019t they replace these legacy applications?<\/p>\n

It usually boils down to one of two reasons.<\/p>\n

1. They\u2019re locked down<\/strong>. These legacy systems run the business. Oftentimes, past customizations have locked the business into a specific software, or version. Replacing these systems comes with considerable cost and risk.<\/p>\n

2. If it ain\u2019t broke, don\u2019t fix it.<\/strong> Other businesses take this mentality towards their legacy applications. \u201cWe\u2019ve been using this for 20 years, and it\u2019s still working fine.\u201d Why replace something that still works?<\/p>\n

In other words, the cost\/effort needed to replace these systems outweighs the cost\/effort to keep them. <\/p>\n

But, is that really true? If your business still uses legacy applications, let me ask you a question: What\u2019s the true cost of those applications? <\/p>\n

It goes far beyond licensing costs. When calculating the costs of legacy applications, you must consider all factors, such as:<\/p>\n

1. Maintenance costs<\/h3>\n
\"photo
photo credit: TiBine<\/a> via pixabay<\/a> cc<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Over time, applications and systems become increasingly difficult to maintain. Every customization and change adds another layer of complexity to the system. Over the years, these changes take their toll. <\/p>\n

Soon, simple updates turn into time-consuming tasks. A change to one area of the application might break another. You find your team dedicating more and more time to maintenance.<\/p>\n

To make matters worse, what happens when you run across a problem you can\u2019t solve? With modern applications, you could find a solution online pretty quickly. But, with legacy applications, troubleshooting becomes far more difficult. <\/p>\n

\n\u201cLess commonly-available information online for legacy platforms means that troubleshooting will require more time dedicated to researching solutions,\u201d says Shaharris, Founder of HackerNest<\/span><\/a>. \u201cWhether it’s you or an employee doing it, it\u2019s inefficient and wastes time.\u201d\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

2. Talent costs<\/h3>\n

\n\u201cMore up-to-date software and platforms means more competency and availability in the hiring pool, ergo cheaper talent,\u201d says Shaharris.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s a great point. Legacy applications require a legacy skillset, which fewer and fewer people possess. As employees with these legacy skillsets reach retirement age, your available talent pool is dwindling. <\/p>\n

What does this mean? With less competition, costs go up. You\u2019re stuck paying more for talent than you would with a modern system.<\/p>\n

3. Support costs<\/h3>\n

What happens when the vendor stops supporting your software version? You can either support it yourself, or upgrade to their latest package. <\/p>\n

But, what happens if you can\u2019t (or don\u2019t want to) upgrade? Or, what happens if the vendor goes out of business? <\/p>\n

\n\u201cMany proprietary legacy systems are no longer supported by the vendor,\u201d explains Tabish Naeem, Senior Manager at MI Dynamics<\/span><\/a>. \u201cUnfortunately, external support is usually expensive and inefficient.\u201d\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Third-party companies will offer you support for your legacy systems…for a hefty fee. Sure, you don\u2019t want to pay their prices, but…what choice do you have? <\/p>\n

It\u2019s a problem you\u2019ll run into time and time again with legacy systems: You lack options. You pay more for talent because your options are limited. You\u2019ll pay more for support for the same reason.<\/p>\n

4. Integration costs<\/h3>\n

Do you like paying for something you could get for free? Neither do I. But, that\u2019s what frequently happens with legacy applications. How?<\/p>\n

Let me explain: Suppose you wanted to integrate your application with a common web service. With a modern application, it\u2019s usually a simple job. After all, modern applications are built with integration in mind. <\/p>\n

With a legacy application, it\u2019s not so simple. As explained below, these \u201csimple\u201d integrations often require custom-coding (if the job is even possible in the first place).<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAnything uncommon enough to be called legacy is no longer (as) regularly or frequently updated as the alternative,\u201d Shaharris. \u201cTherefore any kind of integrations with other software needs to be custom-done, which means highly specialized money going out of your pocket. Imagine having to pay someone to write code for something to sync with GitHub or SVN!\u201d\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

5. Compliance costs<\/h3>\n

Over time, industry regulations and business laws change. Have any regulations or laws changed since you deployed your legacy system? Chances are, they have. <\/p>\n

How much time and effort do you spend ensuring that your software remains compliant? If you\u2019re in a heavily-regulated industry, these costs can add up quickly.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cIndustry and government requirements change,\u201d explains Shaharris. \u201cFor compliance-related software, it can become costly to find workarounds to make software do what you want it to do.\u201d\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

6. Lost opportunity costs<\/h3>\n

According to Inc.com<\/span>, \u201can opportunity cost is the cost of a missed opportunity. It is the opposite of the benefit that would have been gained had an action, not taken, been taken\u2014the missed opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Let me ask you a question: What opportunities have you missed on account of your legacy systems? What features does your business need that your software doesn\u2019t support?<\/p>\n

Would you like to provide mobile data access to your salespeople? <\/p>\n

Would you like to provide better reporting to your executives?<\/p>\n

Would you like to automate manual processes?<\/p>\n

I could go on, but the point is this: Legacy systems will keep every business from certain opportunities. What are those worth to your business?<\/p>\n

7. Agility costs<\/h3>\n

How quickly can your company adapt to changing technology? How quickly can you deliver solutions to the business? Months? Weeks?<\/p>\n

In most cases, legacy systems lack agility. Delivering a new feature or application to the business is a time-consuming process. <\/p>\n

Let me ask you a question: How much does this lost agility cost your company? <\/p>\n

Would you be more competitive? <\/p>\n

Would you sell more products or services?<\/p>\n

While the answer varies by company, agility costs cannot be ignored. Where would your company be if you could provide faster solutions?<\/p>\n

So, what do you think? Is there anything you would add to this list? If so, please share your thoughts in the comments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Summary: Many businesses still run on legacy applications. Is your business one of them? If so, how much are these legacy applications costing your company? It might be more than you think. Here are 7 ways legacy applications can hurt the bottom line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","slim_seo":{"title":"What\u2019s the true cost of your legacy applications? - mrc's Cup of Joe Blog","description":"Summary: Many businesses still run on legacy applications. Is your business one of them? If so, how much are these legacy applications costing your company? It"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9],"class_list":["post-9009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","tag-modernization"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9009"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9009\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14112,"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9009\/revisions\/14112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}