James Governor's Monkchips

On The Analyst Business: Stars, Quadrants and Developers

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Gartner certainly fosters chatter in the “independent” analyst community. How could we not talk about the 900 lb Gorilla? Ever since the Altimeter Group got a gravitational slingshot from Forrester one of the topics under discussion is the Star Analyst firm, and whether a big firm can be one. Can larger firms celebrate their analysts as individuals, or must they have a Corporate Voice and Line?

Anyway I recently posted a response to a conversations the Enterprise Irregulars are having, and thought I might as well cross post here. The Irregulars are some of the smartest guys in the room, with a rough and tumble yet touchingly familial culture. Get Well Soon Vinnie.

Here is what I said:

I see plenty of *stars* at Gartner. and they are all allowed to use twitter and so on. My opinion of the firm has actually improved in recent years (please read further coverage from me here and here).

Far more engagement, far more transparency, and I have some really good friends there. Gartner has plenty of really high quality people and I would happily take advice from Nick Gall (@ironick) or Thomas Otter (@vendorprisey) or Kirk Knoernschild (@pragkirk) or any number of folks. I am loving the more collegiate atmosphere I see at this firm.

Of course the analyst model is to some extent busted, because so much of it predicated on purchasing decisions, rather than running better operations. The quadrant is just the money maker that allows the business to pay the kind of salaries that can pull the likes of Michael Gartenberg (@gartenberg) back into the fold. Scaling a services business is hard. Of course Gartenberg is a Star Analyst- he has more twitter followers than I do 😉

But many of you guys are as guilty of fetishing the buyer as anyone. I have been told that’s the only lens worth looking through. Buyers may have loud voices, and big pocket books, but that doesn’t mean they necessarily understand how work gets done in their organisation. If I am a large enterprise development shop though I should be learning from @pragkirk because he is a world expert on modular design, which you can’t buy as a product.

At RedMonk we celebrate the practitioner and their methods.We don’t chase the buyer. Our way isn’t better- its just different. We all buy insurance products. Gartner provides cover your ass for buyers. Its business.

RedMonk doesn’t offer insurance products, but leading edge advice. We are often four years ahead of the game. We can tell what’s going to happen, if not when. We are all about The New Kingmakers. That is – software developers. That’s another part of the business.

As Stephen puts it:

When developers no longer need procurement, the process of technology adoption shifts fundamentally and, likely, permanently.

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