So, you want to dress up for failure on Halloween? Try Legacy PLM. It’s not a new concept, but can be extremely frightening. To paraphrase Johnny Depp’s Ichabod Crane in Sleepy Hollow, “Villainy wears many masks, none so dangerous as Legacy PLM.”

On the one hand, there’s nothing scarier than a Legacy PLM system on Halloween, or any day, for that matter. That said, do you have any idea how many layers of code you have to wear? And you know, once you put it on, you’re stuck with it, forever.

It’s not like you’ll be able to Uber your way to a Halloween party or have the agility to go door-to-door when the system requires busloads of support people, business analysts, architectures, and data base administrators. You’ll have to drag along a PLM steering committee, and trust me, they’re no fun at parties.

Assuming your deployment team can get you to someone’s door, which sometimes takes up to a year or more, the residents aren’t welcoming. They try to turn off the lights. Nice try.

“Hey, Trick or Treat! . . . You can try to stop me anytime you like . . . but I will never leave!”

You may hear bloodcurdling screams. Not to worry, those are just users. They get especially terrified by your haunting interfaces.  They may complain: “Same ol’ thing—year after year. Why can’t you just upgrade?”

What’re they thinking? C’mon, if you could upgrade, you wouldn’t dress up as a Legacy PLM. It’s the costume that never changes.

If you go through with this, remember, it’s important to promise them something—something you can under-deliver on. It’s part of the shtick. Oh, and don’t forget to litter duplicate parts all over their front lawn. Remember you’re not just daunting, but ancient creepy, and decrepit. Just watch them run for their spreadsheets.

Then you just keep expanding because it’s too hard to move—and they have to keep feeding you and your support staff. Oh, and don’t forget the add-ons and your hidden friends: bad data, bugs, and manual hand-offs.

They’ll try to patch you, get you to work, but in the end, you are Legacy PLM. You will drain everything. That’s what makes you so scary. In the end, they will give up and just try to keep the lights on.

Me, personally? I’d prefer to be a Digital Transformer with super disruptive powers, faster to innovate on an open platform, more flexible and upgradable than Legacy PLM, and able to leap globally because I’m scalable.

Then I can bring my friends, Digital Thread and Digital Twin. It’s not scary, but if you want that connectivity across your extended neighborhood and to see your data fly with speed and agility, this is a more sustainable costume.

 

Beware of Legacy PLM . . . be very afraid.