centralization vs. fragmentation

[Mark Huffman]

I'm not claiming any great insight here, but over a quiet beer this past
weekend, was reflecting on the state of the IT industry and in
particular some of the large organizations that I consult with.
 
For those of us who were in IT before SAP R/3, the eighties and early
nienties was a time of decentralization, with every department wanting
their own database, standalone expert systems etc.
 
Then SAP came along with the central database repository concept - I
remember when I took my first course, the teacher was actually kind of
sheepish about discussing the architecture as it sounded so mainframish.
 
For awhile that architecture swept all before it and all sorts of
systems died only to have their data sucked into some module of SAP. For
workflow the name of the biggest game was implementing cross-module
processes within SAP.
 
But now it seems that the centralization tide has crested and we are
back to decentralization or even fragmentation. Every deparment wants
their own customer database and business rule set (deja vu?) with the
Internet spinning off all sorts of CRM/SCP systems and other acronyms.
 
Now the SAP teams are being accused of reacting too slowly to change
requests and for workflow the biggest game apparently is webflow or for
survival at least backending to a hot new Internet project that just got
budget.
 
Any comments? Would be nice to get a good systems debate going again
rather than just answering the same old questions from consultants who
can't be bothered calling up their online help.