SOA initiatives require a strong focus on management and governance in addition to the right set of technology tools, according to research from IT analyst firm Aberdeen Group. Of the companies surveyed, 60 percent of the SOA best-in-class companies are seeing a positive ROI on their SOA investments.

This is achieved through having greater quality throughout the SOA lifecycle as well as employing SOA-specific operations automation and related governance software for automation. Because SOA introduces a myriad of new design, testing and performance-related issues, IT executives can succeed in developing their SOA lifecycle management plans by concentrating on several primary areas as outlined in the report, including SOA governance and application lifecycle management.

The new benchmark report titled: “Management and Governance: Planning for an Optimized SOA Application Lifecycle,” is based on a survey of more than 210 organizations worldwide. Aimed at identifying emerging best practices for SOA lifecycle management and governance, the independent research was co-sponsored by Mindreef, Inc..

The report cites several primary roadblocks to running an effective SOA, all of which pose an immediate threat to SOA quality. One of these is lowering the cost of lifecycle management. As the volumes of Web services and composite applications scale, change is constant and SOA operational issues become even more obvious. 38 percent of respondents said they were seeing “testing and deployment stage problems spill over into production.” The issue is further exacerbated when companies work with inadequate tools to automate the testing, management and governance of the growing number and complexity of Web services and applications that fall within an SOA. Not only is quality and performance at risk, fear of change impact can result in a static, rigid SOA, essentially eliminating the intended benefits of agility.