Last week I talked about it briefly: Oracle Unified Method, OUM. A way to, completely implement the Oracle Stack, with an Agile vision. The vision Oracle is talking about here is to support the successful implementation of every Oracle product, application, middleware and database. And this is where it gets extremely interesting.

The OUM is based upon the Unified Process. Nothing weird here, RUP (the rational method of UP) is probably the most used iterative implementation method around. Oracle has certainly his own implementation, but that mainly is to be found in the completeness of the method. Not only implementation, but also the other necessary parts of the Enterprise IT lifecycle. These are bound in the three focus areas around OUM: Envision, to ensure the enterprise level processes, Implement, to support the implementation of Oracle technology products and Manage, to support disciplined management of IT projects and programs.

Within these three focus areas, let’s talk Implementation. Oracle Unified Method is developed with some ‘goals’ in mind. These goals can best be described in the way that it’s a complete method framework, in one. A best of breeds situation that come from years of experience of implementing Oracle products by their own consulting force. I’m not the biggest fan of Oracle Consulting, but this seams to make a point.

Especially the combination of a proven approach to Agile projects (which definitely shows us that the method is enormous, but we should only use what we actually need), the technology knowledge inside the toolkit and method and the fact that development using OUM is business driven makes it a great way to implement custom software developed on the Oracle Stack.

OUM helps us to grasp the essence of an Oracle project, and delivers it in a few different ways to the team. Business Analysts, Designers, Developers, Project managers and Architects can all work with their own set of information with a clear method. This is the only framework I’ve seen that’s so complete and yet flexible.

The coming weeks I will show you how the framework actually works and where the real value is to be found. The question remains: how do we get control over the power of the Oracle stack without loosing in Agility?