Legacy Migration as Planned Organizational Change

Traditionally, legacy migration has been viewed as the simple replacement of aged or problematic hardware and software, including the applications, interfaces and databases that compose an information system infrastructure. Our position is that this view is outdated and is at best myopic taking into account that the role of technology is not merely supportive but today pervades every aspect of the way enterprises conduct their business. As such, our position is that migration should be approached as a planned change process that first and foremost requires an understanding and an approach that covers the range of issues and organisational entities involved. In this context, this paper presents such a structured approach that defines the landscape, deals with the semantics of legacy migration and, can be applied by organisations that recognise the need to manage the process in a controlled and not in a piecemeal and ad hoc fashion.