Microsoft created much of the methodology in Motion for its own use in software development, said Ron Savoia, US solutions director – financial services group at Microsoft.

“We did a study six years ago examining how we develop software,” said Merrifield. “What are our competencies? It was a methodology for us to map what we do as a software development company – mapping the capabilities we had in software development and identifying areas where we weren’t as strong as we would like. Then if we wanted to turn some development over to a partner, what development would that be? And what do we have to keep in-house? We developed this internally, and then one of our executives said this is something that applies to every business. It maps to their core competences and market offerings.”

Microsoft named the process Motion because it was created to help businesses meet the challenge of a fast-moving world – acknowledging that businesses are always in motion today, said Merrifield.

“Businesses need a new lens for a more holistic view of their business architecture,” said Merrifield. This lens will help firms more clearly see what their performance levers are, he explained.

The business architecture lens helps a firm see which capabilities directly drive performance and which don’t. For example, payroll is important, but it doesn’t drive profitability. By sorting through tasks and deciding which are important for future growth, a company can focus on the valuable capabilities and just maintain, or outsource, the capabilities that may be essential but won’t contribute to increased profitability.

Motion is itself a fast-paced, fixed-price approach that aims for results in tight time frames – no dawdling about running up consulting fees here. Every two weeks Motion has phase gates where consultants and the clients at the firm review where they are, where they want to go, whether the project is still on track, and if the Motion program needs to stop for a while to allow time for the firm to implement the changes that have been identified.

“It is a very, very quick project, very prescriptive, and the users are part of it from the beginning,” explained Prieto. “We are really about helping you understand your business value and using Motion as an approach showing the ‘as is’ and ‘to be.’”

Microsoft developed Motion based on some patents it had filed, along with input from Accelare, a Wellesley, MA-based consultancy founded by Jack Calhoun and Mark McCormick, pioneers of business re-engineering. Motion goes beyond re-engineering and business process – although it complements those approaches and its results often lead to extensive work in both of those areas. MCS typically comes in to develop a capability map on a fast-track, fixed-price contract, and then the firm can contract with BearingPoint, Accenture or another consulting firm to implement the needed changes that have been identified.

“Not only do we understand the architecture, but we also understand the processes,” said Prieto. “How many times have we seen huge infrastructures, but then the firm has built workarounds to make those systems respond to current business requirements. Those add-ons which make their systems run tend to get lost in the chaff.”

MCS has a few key questions when it walks into a bank: How do you close your books? Can you do it without an Excel spreadsheet?

“Very few firms can say they close their books with internal systems and don’t use Excel,” said Prieto. “Excel is the most common workaround tool in financial services.”