More Team Foundation Server Business Case Talk

Here is a piece of advice for those of you who are trying to build a business case for TFS and are currently using VSS for source code control. Don't use as your sole business case the fact that getting licenses for TFS is cheaper than continuing with the licensing for VSS.

I know this is not true for all as Microsoft has a floating cost structure and different companies pay for different things. However in our case there was a significant cost savings by switching over.

I spoke with Microsoft reps and MVP's for TFS and most say that their customers are switching mainly for the more robust and reliable of the transactional approach to version control that TFS has. Further the ability to decommission VSS is the most compelling reason they have heard.

While all this is good and well, many companies have the problem in that the business has to approve work that IT does. It is hard to convince someone who is getting pressure to build the next great system for managing their sales force that they should instead spend on a product where the immediate benefits are not directed to the business in a way that is easy to communicate. I know, because we tried that approach and although it hasn't failed yet, it certainly didn't blow their skirt up.

If I had the ability to start over, I would not focus on version control at all. I would focus on the features that provide the most direct benefits to the business. For example I know that TFS allows for the development process to be more transparent. To me this is a huge benefit to the business. Instead of spending countless time with the business facing side of IT trying to determine percent complete on the different deliverables in a project, they can get those reports through SharePoint in a second. Further they can see quickly if projects are going out of scope, find out if they can reign things back in or if the scope creep was necessary. If so they can communicate this to the users requesting the new system and have documentation ready that explains the added cost.

Cost savings is another things that I would try and drive home better. I would not focus on the licensing cost savings at all. Instead I would try and champion the need for tighter code management, code reuse, and code consolidation. Instead of trying to manage dozens of different code repositories, we would only need one. If a developer is looking for some help in some area of functionality they can search for other code that may help them because now it is all in one place. And if I want to establish a culture of Object Oriented development techniques and have put in some standards, I have a much better chance of monitoring adherence if I can see all checkin's that are going on.

Hopefully someone will chime in on their war stories of trying to get TFS approved.