BM565 Report: Change Management and Legacy Systems

This report delves into the critical aspects of change management within the context of digital business and new technologies, focusing on the challenges and opportunities associated with legacy systems. It examines the need for organizations to modernize their IT infrastructure to remain competitive, detailing the drivers behind this shift, such as evolving corporate strategies, changing regulations, and the high costs of maintaining outdated systems. The report explores the lifecycle of IT in legacy systems, providing examples of these systems and the transition to new technologies like cloud-based SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS. It discusses the applications of legacy systems in business, from operating systems to ERP and CRM software, and connects these concepts to the course's content on digital transformation. Highlighting the benefits of adopting new systems, such as improved customer experience and streamlined operations, the report emphasizes the importance of change management and leadership development in successfully implementing these transitions. Furthermore, it covers best practices in legacy software modernization, risks associated with digital transformation and the need for developing a vision, creating a roadmap and setting measurable goals to achieve the objectives of digital transformation.

4/12/2020
Running Head: IT 0
Digital business and new technologies

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Change Management - deal with legacy systems and
install new systems
Change management is a structured approach to dealing with the transformation and
transition of organisation goals, processes and technologies (Hornstein, 2015). In various
organisations specifically big and old, legacy applications and systems serve vital roles in
driving business operations in support of process information or maintenance of data.
However, with development of technologies and changing industry competitive structure,
there is an annual consideration for the businesses of whether it means upgrading their legacy
systems into somewhat new technology that offers a lot of new features. For some
organisations, updating legacy systems perceived as a cumbersome process comprising a lot
of costs and practices to account for (Gholami et al, 2017). Many new organisations are
countering this change management challenge by actively seeking out feedback during the
planning stages of businesses.
The topic change management in relation with dealing with the legacy system by installing
new systems is deemed to be important as older systems are becoming a legitimate issue as
they are complex to update, especially at the time of connecting to new kinds of technology.
At the end, they present significant barriers to organisational digital transformation and
technology adaption which is currently the most important factors to be competitive and
business sustainability. Hence, to get to the next level, organisations required to migrate their
operations with digital infrastructure so as to come up with more integrated solutions and
products (Crotty and Horrocks, 2017). In addition, the retention of legacy IT systems also
comes with a unique set of risks where until the time comes when the system can be replaced,
such risks are manageable through adequate planning, attentiveness and care.
In association with evolution and development of legacy systems, there are various drivers
for having this system evolve and migrate to the new systems and all starts with organisation
corporate strategy. With changing business landscape, the corporate strategy of business
organisations are redefining from a conventional data processing model to a multi-faceted
and service oriented channel and this also creates the needs to have updated information
occurring from multiple sources. The next driver is changing regulations and legal
requirements and taking an example of this, US Government Accountability Office (GAO)
stated that legacy systems are in a need of modernization or they can be exposed to crashes or

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security breaches anytime. It further started with most of the government institutions and
departments like department of defence, department of education, department of treasury and
so on (altexsoft.com, 2020).
The total cost of ownership of existing legacy systems also becomes prohibitive as of system
diversity and the software maintenance cost. The development and need of change are also
pushed as of growing volume of the business creating challenges in performances in
association with large evolutionary capacity. All these factors and drivers stimulating
companies to prepare for the digital future and facilitate change management so as to deploy
new systems with replacing of legacy systems (Peng and Gala, 2014).
According to Serrano, Hernantes and Gallardo (2014), a legacy system is an information
system that may be based on outdated technologies, however, it is critical to day-to-day
operations. These legacy systems running on an out-dated mainframe for core business
operations such as high-volume data processing and from past several years, these systems
are adapted to offer specific functionality. But the needs for modernisation comes around
when their software and hardware started receiving issues due to big flow of data and also the
system also moving near security vulnerabilities. Taking about the incident on Tax Day 2018
in the US, the internal revenue service faced technical issues when it couldn’t able to process
electronically filed tax returns and they were around six decades old (maybe one of the
reasons to the system glitch) (altexsoft.com, 2020).
A legacy system also not every time determine by its age, as there are other factors too such
as base of technology, lack of management support, IT team failure and so forth. As change
management is the topic, the technology platforms and software associated to it includes
legacy systems and applications. The lifecycle of information technology in legacy systems is
becoming shorter every year as due to the evolution of digital processes and practices and the
new competitors in the disruptive industries (Plimmer et al, 2017). There is no particular
technology in legacy system as every organisation had developed their own legacy systems
according to their business model and that fit for purpose in each individual application and
data structures of an organisation.
Considering the business and organisations using technology, it can be found in any
governmental institutions or big scale organisation operating in different industries. In these
institutions and organisations, legacy system still exists as they are challenging to replace
particularly when they power important business process in an enterprise. As they are well

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structures as per the business model, the risk of changing the status quo can be too high.
Some of the legacy systems examples include hardware in power plants, production
machineries controlled by systems running MS-DOS or obsolete financial systems. The new
system replacing legacy systems are using cloud technology and platforms named as
Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service
(IaaS) (Zhao and Zhou, 2014).
There are various uses of legacy system in business such as operating system that powers to a
business other applications and software’s associated for product designing, customer
feedback, and software packages associated to ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning),
accounting and finance software’s and CRM (Customer Relationship Management). They
used as a business tool in enterprises while bridging the gap between different functional
needs of departments in the organisation even after termination of vendor support (Sneed and
Verhoef, 2019). Taking an example, the HR division using the legacy system can identify
how much candidates he needs to target in the market as per the vacancy and skills needed in
different departments of the organisation such as marketing, finance, research and
development and so on. On the basis of external environment, these legacy systems help in
identifying the customer experience and feedback, supplier’s demands and information.
Change management and installing new system over legacy system can be further related to
course as there the studied was near to define business model in the new world of digital
transformation where rapid advancement in ICTs showcases the significance of
organisational success achievable through embracing digital technology, integration with
social media and digital supply chain. This new development cannot take place in the absence
of new proprietary or vendor based system and therefore, necessitates the need for enforcing
change management so as to manifest new systems with dementing legacy systems at all
levels. In association to the course, it is also important to develop an awareness of the various
risks and threats moving near to organisational business environment in range with
technology and innovation. Embracing over latest technology and digitalization is not only
occurring at organisational level, but it is also taking pace in different countries and further
reached customer usage. Simply, customer behaviour is shifting towards the digital world,
and this making digital transformation to be enabled at rapid change integrated with business
model (Vassileva, 2017). In the same way, the legacy systems must be swapped with new
systems so as to bridge the gap between current offering and customer expectations.

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One of the best practice in legacy software modernization can be WMU (Warrants,
Maintenance and Upgrade) representing a customer centric methods that choose maintenance
strategies based on customer satisfaction. The benefits of installing new systems can also be
linked to the digital transformations where companies can gain in one or more areas such as
better customer experience, customised engagement and streamlined operations and new
lines of business or business models (Varga et al, 2017). The clearest impact of digital
transformation can be seen with the customer experience and it was also identified that
improving customer relationship showcases an area where organisations were having the
most success with digital technology. Despite of the progressing acknowledgement in need
for digital transformation, many organisations facing challenges to gain clear business
benefits and also replacing legacy systems due to ineffective leadership, costs and relevant
experiences. According to Fitzgerald (2013) research reports, limitations of IT systems
ranked 3rd on the list of significant organisational barriers to digital transformation. In
addition, organisations in which entire business is digital may not use technology very
effectively. In relation with new systems, it is very important for organisations to develop
their infrastructure and tools on hosted tools, embracing social media. The new systems are
now working on an online SaaS framework of cloud and get to the next level, businesses
required to migrate many of their digital operations and infrastructures into more integrated
solutions.
The nature of new system replacing the legacy system will be based on a specified checklist
including assessment of current state of legacy systems rethinking of the architecture,
modernization approach, selection of right technology stack (in order to offer optimal
performance and user experience) and system updates. After undertaking the comprehensive
assessment of the legacy framework, it is also necessary to follow well-selected strategies in
an efficient pattern such as Architecture-Driven Modernization (ADM), Reverse Engineering
Model and legacy modernization models including the evolutionary way and revolutionary
method (Lettner et al, 2019). With following all measures granted, organisations can leverage
new functionalities of the system with better security, tighter compliance, new programming
languages and user interface. Taking the legacy system as a context, the leaders in the
enterprises can develop an up-to-date product with extensive matching capabilities, improved
performance and scalable architecture. Ultimately, the technology will embrace a cycle
reshaping the business model pacing more towards digital transformation.

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In association with emerging theories on management and business structures, change
management is a foundation and cannot be regarded as history or theoretical framework.
With increasing digital transformation, leadership development and change management tend
to become top priorities and for better results, McCleskey (2014) also stated that
organisations should coordinate their change management efforts and leadership development
with all necessary components of a benchmarking. In simple words, the bottom line of
change management framework and process requires the potential leaders throughout the
business firm so as to engage in a process of learning while mobilizing and achieving
complex tasks. A successful top-down process also initiates with executives illuminating the
expected result for change management and take in charge to eliminate significant barriers
causing direct or indirect influence on the change management activities. Afterward, selected
leaders take the position, responsibility and support to engage the process in order to achieve
the set objectives with in the particular time frame. In this way, change management can also
be regarded as the way to which legacy system in an organisation can be replaced with new
systems.
In the limelight of above discussion and based on the course readings, digital transformation
is a wide and open area one that gives business a holistic outlook of the business
environment. It can only be achievable if the organisation deploy new systems either by using
different vendor solutions or developing and refining their proprietary systems. Considering
digital transformation, organisational leaders should also develop a vision to articulate the
employees, while creating a road map and coming up with measurable goals and incentives to
reach them. More than half of the global economy is now turning towards digital requiring
new species of organisations to thrive and compete with using the latest technologies and
architecture solutions. The barriers to digital inclusion also need to be identified so that
management could pick the right direction and accordingly create a road map for the same
with inspiring employee so that innovation fatigue can be reduced.

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References
altexsoft.com. (2020) Legacy System Modernization: How to Transform the Enterprise for
Digital Future [ONLINE] Available from: https://www.altexsoft.com/whitepapers/legacy-
system-modernization-how-to-transform-the-enterprise-for-digital-future/ [Accessed
12/04/2020].
Crotty, J. and Horrocks, I. (2017) Managing legacy system costs: A case study of a meta-
assessment model to identify solutions in a large financial services company. Applied
computing and informatics, 13(2), pp.175-183.
Fitzgerald, M. (2013) MITSLOGAN research report 2013 [Accessed 12/04/2020].
Gholami, M.F., Daneshgar, F., Beydoun, G. and Rabhi, F. (2017) Challenges in migrating
legacy software systems to the cloud—an empirical study. Information Systems, 67(1),
pp.100-113.
Hornstein, H.A. (2015) The integration of project management and organizational change
management is now a necessity. International Journal of Project Management, 33(2),
pp.291-298.
Lettner, M., Rodas, J., Galindo, J.A. and Benavides, D. (2019) Automated analysis of two-
layered feature models with feature attributes. Journal of Computer Languages, 51(1),
pp.154-172.
McCleskey, J.A. (2014) Situational, transformational, and transactional leadership and
leadership development. Journal of Business Studies Quarterly, 5(4), p.117.
Peng, G.C.A. and Gala, C. (2014) Cloud ERP: a new dilemma to modern
organisations?. Journal of Computer Information Systems, 54(4), pp.22-30.
Plimmer, G., Bryson, J., Donnelly, N., Wilson, J., Ryan, B. and Blumenfeld, S. (2017) The
legacy of New Public Management (NPM) on workers, management capabilities, and
organisations. New Zealand Journal of Employment Relations, 42(1), p.19.
Serrano, N., Hernantes, J. and Gallardo, G. (2014) Service-oriented architecture and legacy
systems. IEEE software, 31(5), pp.15-19.

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Sneed, H. and Verhoef, C. (2019) Re-implementing a legacy system. Journal of Systems and
Software, 155(1), pp.162-184.
Varga, P., Blomstedt, F., Ferreira, L.L., Eliasson, J., Johansson, M., Delsing, J. and de Soria,
I.M. (2017) Making system of systems interoperable–The core components of the arrowhead
framework. Journal of Network and Computer Applications, 81(1), pp.85-95.
Vassileva, B. (2017) Marketing 4.0: How technologies transform marketing
organization. Obuda university e-Bulletin, 7(1), p.47.
Zhao, J.F. and Zhou, J.T. (2014) Strategies and methods for cloud migration. International
Journal of Automation and Computing, 11(2), pp.143-152.