In this webinar recording, James Taylor, CEO of Decision Management Solutions and Claye Greene, Managing Director of Government Solutions Provider TechBlue share learnings and best practices from their extensive experience helping clients modernize their legacy systems with the targeted decision management approach. You will learn why you don’t need to modernize the whole application, why focusing on business rules is not enough; decision management is the essential ingredient and how to use decision modeling to identify and scope targeted legacy modernization efforts.

1. Best Practices in
Targeted Legacy
Modernization in
Government

2. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 2
Your Presenters
James Taylor
CEO of Decision
Management Solutions
We help clients to improve
their business by applying
business rules and analytic
technology to automate and
improve decisions
I have spent the 11 years
championing Decision
Management and developing
Decision Management
Systems
Claye Greene
Managing Director of
TechBlue
Works with clients to
transform and modernize
using innovative technologies
and approaches
Specializes in the adoption of
Decision Management and
Service-Oriented
Architectures
Over 15 years experience
implementing software
solutions

3. Agenda
Challenges in
Modernization
Decision Making in
Legacy Systems
TheValue of Business
Rules
Decision Management
The Essential Framework
Decision Modeling in
Legacy Modernization
3©2014 Decision Management Solutions

4. Challenges In
Modernization

5. © TechBlue, 2014 5
The Cost Of Legacy Modernization
70%
GovernmentAccoutability Office
reports that Federal agencies are
spending 70% of their IT budgets on
maintaining legacy systems.
Over $50 billion being spent on
outdated systems, instead of
developing new capabilities.
70% - 80% of the world‘s data resides on mainframes,
and is managed by over 200 billion lines of COBOL code

6. © TechBlue, 2014 6
The Impact Of Legacy Systems
• Lack of agility slows response in mission-critical systems
• Policies are buried in code with long change cycle
1
Operational Weakness
• Test and learn is not an option
• What you learn cannot be applied
2
No learning
• Maintaining legacy systems is expensive
• Changing them can be even more expensive
3
High operating costs
• New capabilities that secure systems are unavailable
• Patches to system security are more quickly outdated
4
Security risks

7. © TechBlue, 2014 7
Benefits Of Legacy Modernization
Legacy
Modernization
Improve
enterprise
architecture
effectiveness
Standardize IT
platforms
Strengthen IT
investments
Modernize IT
guidance and
training
Strengthen IT
Governance
Enable Agile IT

8. © TechBlue, 2014 8
Several Modernization Approaches Exist
Retain as is Outsource Convert
Refactor Enhance Rebuild
Componentize Upgrade 1 2 Replace
Retire
But for many organizations, retaining, outsourcing, upgrading and
retiring aren‘t viable

9. © TechBlue, 2014 9
Modernization Challenges
And for other organizations, several factors influence the most
appropriate approach
Overall time of modernization Required personnel skills
Existing legacy reuse
Business process changes
Overall level of effort of modernization
Changes to underlying architecture
Overall cost of modernization
Dependency on legacy platform
Overall level of effort
Modernization risks

10. Decision Making In Legacy
Systems

11. © TechBlue, 2014 11
Decision-making Matters
Decisions embedded
in mainframe code, or
modernized code (ie
Java, C#, etc)
Many struggle with getting the decisions in the hands of the
people that kow them best

12. © TechBlue, 2014 12
Decisioning Problems In Legacy
High rate of change
Business-oriented decisions change
more frequently than traditional IT
pace of change
Reporting
Business decisions are not easily
reported from within legacy systems
Business knows best
Business decisions are generally best
understood by the business
Decisions are not processes
Business decisions are generally best
managed independent of the business
processes
For business-oriented systems, getting the decisions in the hands
of the business should be a key strategic outcome of legacy
modernization

13. © TechBlue, 2014 13
Improving Legacy System Decisions
Decision improvements
Improving the selection and
allocation of work
Reducing and / or eliminating
risk of fraud
Optimize
Fraud
Management
Improving detection of illicit
transactions
Simulation (war-gaming) of
mission-critical scenarios
Improved
awareness
Strategic
planning
Improving tactical response to
hazardous situations
Protection
and safety
Decision improvements
Improved situational
awareness and accelerating
response time
Scenario simulation to
optimize resource allocation
and usage
Awareness
Simulation
Improved customer
satisfaction through informed,
proactive decisioning
Improved management and
stewardship of government
funds
Customer
relations
Fiscally
responsible
Increase the strategic and
monetary value of enterprise
data
Data value

14. © TechBlue, 2014 14
Modernizing Decisions
Retain as is Outsource Convert
Refactor Enhance Rebuild
Componentize Upgrade 1 2 Replace
Retire
1. Refactor to find decisions
2. Componentize to separate them
3. Enhance them with business rules

15. Introducing Business
Rules

16. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 16
Business Rules Drive Decisions
But are a black
box in most legacy
systems

17. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 17
Business Rules Deliver Transparency

18. © Decision Management Solutions, 2014 18
Example Business Rules
Total Number
of Orders
Most Recent
Order
Total Orders
last 12
months
Lifetime
OrderTotal
Customer
Status
>= 5 < 90 days > $10,000 Gold
>=10 < 180 days > $20,000 Gold
>= 20 < 360 days > $40,000 Gold
< 180 days > $1,000,000 Gold
> $2,000,000 Gold
If Patient’s DrugList contains “Drug1”
and Patient’s DrugList contains “Drug2”
then add “Drug 1 and Drug2 can interact in patients with high blood pressure” to
DrugConflictReasons
and set DrugConflictLevel to “Warning”
If thisPart is of type “Fuel Tank”
and thisPart < 1m from anyPart of type “Battery”
then move(thisPart)

19. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 19
Elements Of A BRMS
Decision
Service
Testing and
Debugging
Technical Rule
Management
Non-technical
Rule
Management
Impact
Analysis
Data
Management
Verification
andValidation
Deployment
Rule
Repository

20. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 20
Business Rules Management System
Design
Transparency
Execution
Transparency
Impact Analysis Collaboration

21. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 21
Business Rules Deliver Agility
ADD #2,+VCSDTFPD,RESULT=DTIN4A
ADD #1,+ZW0DTFPD,RESULT=DTOUT4A
CALL Z#SCMPDT,0,0,0,0,0,P2=DTIN4A,P3=DTOUT4A
ADD #2,+VCSNEXPD,RESULT=DTIN5A
ADD #1,+ZW0NEXPD,RESULT=DTOUT5A
CALL Z#SCMPDT,0,0,0,0,0,P2=DTIN5A,P3=DTOUT5A
SUB (ZW0NEXPD,#1),(ZW0DTFPD,#1),RESULT=ZW0#DAYS,PREC=DDD
DO WHILE,(ZW0#DAYS,LT,ZL0DW090,DWORD)
MOVE ZW0VALUE,2,WORD
ADD #2,+VCSNEXPD,RESULT=ZC1DTIN
CALL Z#SCMPDT,ZC1DTIN,(ZW0NXOUT),0,0,ZW0VALUE
CALL Z#SCNVDT,(ZW0NXOUT),(ZW1NXDT)
MOVE (VCSNEXPD,#2),ZW1NXDT,(4,BYTE)
CONVTB ZW1NEXPD,(VCSNEXPD,#2),PREC=D,FORMAT=(6,0,I)
CONVTD ZW0NEXYR,ZW1NEXPD+4,PREC=S,FORMAT=(2,0,I)
IF (ZW0NEXYR,LE,ZL025,2)
ADD ZW0NEXYR,ZL12000
ELSE
ADD ZW0NEXYR,ZL01900
ENDIF
while (the newExpirationDate of feeVehicle < the dateFeesReceived of feeVehicle + 90 days)
do {
the newExpirationDate of feeVehicle = the newExpirationDate of feeVehicle + 2 years
}
Which would you
rather maintain?

22. ©2014 TechBlue 22
The Benefit Of Business Rules
Decisions used by
legacy systems
Business Rule Management Systems are the solution
Rule
Repository

23. Decision Management
The Essential Framework

24. © TechBlue, 2014 24
The Good, The Bad And The Ugly
ImpactFact
Organizations are adopting business
rules more today than any other time
before
Most organizations that implement
business rules focus on the technology
first, forgetting about strategy and
organization
Many organizations approach legacy
modernization by extracting business
rules and implementing in a BRMS
Good
Bad
Ugly
Organizations are accelerating
operational performance, reducing risk
and making better decisions
Organizations are struggling to create
and sustain momentum for successful
transformation into a decision-centric
organization
Many business rules adoptions in legacy
modernization require a major refactor
within 2 years of initiation

25. © TechBlue, 2014 25
Avoiding J.A.B.O.R.
Don’t forget about the “Decision” in Decision Management
• Don’t just jump in and start writing code
• Focus on decisions, not rules. Avoid J.A.B.O.R. (Just A Bunch Of Rules)
[jab-er] –noun : indistinct, nonsensical talk; gibberish
• Adopt a proven methodology for harvesting, expressing, authoring and maintaining decisions
• Don’t forget about governance
• Don’t move your legacy application to a new platform
You are here to better manage your decisions,
not manage more code

26. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 26
5 Steps to Success
Analyze the
code to find,
isolate the
decisions
Retire the replaced
legacy code
Use the BRMS to
redeploy the
rules as a
Decision Service
accessible to the
legacy system
Work out the
rules for these
decisions and
document them
in a BRMS
Model the
decisions so you
understand
them
Analyze
Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 Step 5
Model Organize Redeploy Retire
How to approach business rules adoption from
legacy systems

27. Decision Modeling in
Legacy Modernization

28. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 28
How To Describe Decisions
Information
• What is needed?
• Where does it come
from?
Know-how
• How to make it
• How to improve it
Precision
• Exactly how?
• Specificity without
technical details

29. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 29
Decisions Require Information
“ValidateTax Return”
requires Return and Citizen information
“Calculate License Fee”
requiresVehicle and Applicant information

30. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 30
Decisions Require Knowledge
“ValidateTax Return”
requiresTax Regulations
“Calculate License Fee”
requires Legacy System andVehicle Code

31. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 31
Decompose Decisioning
What is required to make decision?
Information
Guidelines, policy
Expertise
Regulations
Predictive Analytic Models
Data Mining Results
The results of other decisions

32. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 32
Decisions Require Decisions
These decisions must be made first
Scale up and down

33. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions
Develop A Decision Model

34. Decision Modeling and Notation (DMN)
“… provide a common notation that is readily
understandable by all business users... DMN creates a
standardized bridge for the gap between the business
decision design and decision implementation.”
Use Cases
Modeling Human Decision-making
Modeling Requirements for automated Decision-making
Implementing automated Decision-making
OMG Beta Specification
Released Standard expected mid-2014
Decision Management Solutions, IBM, Oracle,TIBCO, FICO, Escape
Velocity, KUL, Model Systems, KPI,Visumpoint
©2014 Decision Management Solutions

35. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 35
Case: State Agency
Key objectives
Don’t require complete rewrite of legacy
Usable by non-technical analysts
Comprehensive business control
It must run quickly and scale on all platforms
Identified key decision – “What is correct fee”
Externalized just that decision

36. ©2014 Decision Management Solutions 36
Case: State Agency
Outcome
2,000+ rules stored in central repository
60,000+ transactions/day across batch and online
Rules easily updated by non-technical business people
Benefits
Managed, demonstrable compliance
Rapid response to policy changes
ROI example
First day there was an error
Fix took 15 minutes v 2-8 hours: 87%-97% reduction

37. Questions?

38. Recap and Next Steps

39. Succeed With Decisions

40. © TechBlue, 2014 40
Modern Systems = Higher Performance
Modernized Platform
More and more, Federal Agencies require access to, and
incorporation of more recent information technology trends to
meet mission critical requirements
Without modernized platforms, old systems will continually hold
back Agencies from accelerating and sustaining higher operational
performance
Big Data Cloud
Decision
Management
Optimization

41. Decisions First
Decisions first, rules second
Make Decisions part of Business Architecture
Adopt Decision Modeling
41©2014 Decision Management Solutions

42. More Resources
White papers
Simplifying Legacy Modernization
Decision Modeling with DMN
http://decisionmanagementsolutions.com/white-papers
Books
Decision Management Systems
The MicroGuide to BPMN and DMN
http://decisionmanagementsolutions.com/books
©2015 Decision Management Solutions

43. DecisionsFirst Modeler
A collaborative decision modeling software that conforms
to the new Decision Model and Notation (DMN) standard.
©2015 Decision Management Solutions
DecisionsFirst Modeler is available as a free BasicVersion (SaaS) and a paid
Enterprise Edition (SaaS or on-premise). Sign up at www.decisionsfirst.com

44. Thank You
JamesTaylor
james@decisionmanagementsolutions.com
Claye Greene
clayegreene@techblue.com
More on Decision Management at
decisionmangementsolutions.com
techblue.com