By Malik Azeez, Director of PIM and Offshore Delivery
Scalability defined
Scalability is the measure of a system’s ability to increase or decrease in performance and cost in response to changes in application and system processing demands. (Gartner)
How well does a system perform when the number of users grows? As queries increase, how does a database respond? As an enterprise expands globally, how do their hardware, software, and process solutions scale?
Scalability… so what?
Solutions built in our never-slowing technological climate depend on flexibility. Rarely do organizations have one on-premise server focused on one business challenge delivering to one customer. Business problems and goals ebb and flow – but more likely than not, just keep growing.
This flexibility is key when building solutions and implementing software. It’s not enough to simply address the challenge at hand. Rather, you must build a foundation that enables you to address future challenges. This never-slowing technological growth requires solutions to be scalable into the next decade, with components that allow exponential growth for business requirements yet to be defined. On top of this, they must also be ready to integrate with other future solutions seamlessly.
What does that look like?
Paradigm recently put together an e-commerce product mastering solution in place for a global client. The immediate challenge we were solving focused on data pertaining specifically to their North American market.
Our team built the foundation of this solution to be scalable. When our client decides to bring this solution global, naturally the data sets are going to differ vastly – not just in the number of product records or SKUs, but by the challenges seen across various regions and markets. For example, the North American solution focuses data in English, but on a global scale, dozens of additional languages will need to be accounted for. Built with flexibility in mind at the foundation, our client’s solution will scale to accommodate global factors.
More about scaling globally
As you can see, solutions shouldn’t just focus on local markets, but scale for relevance across multiple markets. It’s important to keep the global approach of your solutions in mind as they open up avenues for additional enterprise growth and opportunity. Global market presence means increased opportunities and higher revenues.
Think of the e-commerce example above – by being poised to scale globally, our client will be able to support their customers across a variety of regions. Improving customer experience, expanding their services, and growing their business.
What does scalability mean to your organization? Are your newest initiatives built with a scalable foundation? Preparing for flexibility not only enables organizational growth, but success in the ever-evolving technological landscape. Start your scalability journey today with Paradigm.