Have you done this before? It’s one of the first questions clients ask during a technology selection process. And it’s a fair question. While the answer is usually yes, it’s not really true, is it? We may have implemented X solution for an organization in Y industry, but does that really mean as much as the client thinks it does? Experience matters. Just not in the way most people think. 

I was having lunch with a friend who had recently moved from leading customer-facing digital products into a B2B manufacturer with a much less mature digital organization. We started talking about why consulting teams struggle when they change industries, and it reinforced something I’ve believed for years.

It’s knowing how to walk into an organization, extract real information from people with different, sometimes conflicting, agendas, and translate that information into requirements and a design that holds up

It’s tempting to think technology projects are mostly about installing software and configuring it correctly. And let’s be honest – Sales is not helping us here. But digital ecosystems are rarely the same. Structures for integration, even within the same platforms, are wildly different. The internal processes organized around business functions are distinct by organization. The problems these solutions intend to solve are diverse, and so is the value they generate, even if they seem similar on the surface. Heck, even the personalities and politics within the organization have a significant impact on delivery. 

So, what does matter?  

The fundamentals.  

Requirements. 

Architecture. 

Governance. 

Identity. 

Testing. 

Deployment. 

Change management. 

It’s knowing how to walk into an organization, extract real information from people with different, sometimes conflicting, agendas, and translate that information into requirements and a design that holds up. It’s the understanding that without change management, the best solution implementation won’t move the needle. 

The details of these activities will vary for each engagement, but their core processes do not. These disciplines don’t change because the logo on the building changes. Technology evolves. The disciplines don’t. Do them correctly, and the specific technologies matter less. So, does experience in a particular type of project matter? Of course it does. Experience gives you the knowledge of which nuances to add to certain workshop questions, which pitfalls to avoid, and how to recognize targeted patterns unique to the situation. But without strong fundamentals, none of it matters. 

So, when someone asks, “Have you done this before?”, they’re asking the wrong question. 

A better question is: 

How do you approach the work that every successful project has in common? 

Because platforms change. Vendors come and go. Industries transform. 

Good engineering fundamentals don’t.