Decide, Act, Be Eaten
I am not alone in finding Scott Adam's Dilbert one of the funniest and most terrifying comic strips ever. Funny because so many of the strip's characters depict, do, or say the silly, insipid and often clueless things we hear and see happen around us every day.
Terrifying for the same reasons.
Sometimes it’s a fun-house mirror but a mirror nonetheless.
A recent strip is a great example. The pointy haired boss is pushing ahead with a merger - with some aliens - because he urgently wants to get something done:
How often is it the case that, in a rush to appear productive or decisive, we take action, any action, without a considered plan?
How often does that succeed?
How often is Information Technology more about the technology than the information?
How often is that the vendor's fault?
Most of our marketing and customer conversations tend to center on the technology parts. So, what about the information parts? In particular, what information should be stated clearly, even aggressively, about the value of professional consulting services - and how they help innocents avoid becoming a source of protein?
EMC has some very sophisticated, experienced and tech savvy customers. They teach us new things every day. Of course, we also employ many well-schooled creative and dedicated field professionals. And they learn new things every day.
Over time, we have processed and organized the learning from these and many other sources to create a very impressive knowledge pool. Combined with experience it can substantially decrease your chance of being eaten.
EMC aggregates the experience and knowledge from hundreds of these client engagements and it becomes a resource to the entire team and to every customer - across the globe.
Customers will sometimes assert, reasonably, that they know how to accomplish their objectives with no outside assistance. (I said this to my wife just before we hired our kitchen contractor.)
Now, if there were only more hours in a day and those irritating project deadlines would just go away.
So much to do and so little time...
I've noted before that much of the opportunity for IT efficiency gains will come from three key strategies:
- Consolidate
- Optimize
- Automate
The question is how?
What should be done? How? And in what sequence? What are the other IT impacts? What is the ROI? What are the risks?
What will prevent visits from the pointy haired boss or nightmare aliens?
So, if you buy the experience / expertise / time rationale for signing up the services team, what should you expect for results?
I've spent a good deal of time lately with our service professionals. They have their own way of looking at the technology....
To start, there is always the question of where does the customer stand? How much energy is being consumed and by what? How well utilized are the IT assets? And what about the data itself? Has it been accessed recently or is it stale? Does it have any value at all? How many copies are there and where should they be stored?
One great proof point regularly emerges from file system assessments. Our consulting teams offer a simple file system assessment service. They will even do free samples because the results are so compelling. What they often find is that 70%+ of the data stored on premium infrastructure hasn't been touched in 90 days or more.
In that case, doesn't it make sense to move it to a less expensive and more energy efficient tier? How about if the movement can be policy driven and happen automatically?
This is only one example of how understanding key conditions and metrics will better optimize data center operations and energy efficiency - save cost too.
Another service evaluates energy use by segment - server, storage, network, air conditioning etc. This is important to establish a baseline and to model predictions on likely future scenarios. Things like, when will you run out of capacity, or how can you alter the path you are on?
From there the discussions become more sophisticated and probably more complicated. For example, what are the information challenges and which are most pressing:
•Policies and processes…..
•Records and content management…
•Compliance, SOX, and regulations
•Privacy and freedom of information concerns
•Litigation and record retrieval
Do you have PST and MP3 rules? Do you do periodic sweeps? Do users clearly understand your archive and retention standards? Are they followed?
Some data you want to delete. Some data you need to make sure is never deleted. Are all of the required processes in place? Are they monitored and logged?
Because of these kinds of elemental issues, IT has big business impacts - positive when things are done right and protein for the aliens if not.
Infrastructure offers even more challenges:
•Physical space, power, cooling…
•Limited availability and cost of energy…
•Technology infrastructure utilization…
And understanding of all of these will require metrics to make decisions as well as planning data to evaluate current infrastructure and to support future designs.
You can't do it all at once but several discrete services can be applied, as you are ready.
Some examples:
•Infrastructure Optimization Services: address strategy, planning, design, and implementation of industry best practices for enterprise data centers
•Data Migration Services: expedite implementation, and minimize business risk
•Efficient Data Center Assessments: guidelines and metrics for energy efficient data center operations, including strategy development, roadmap and operational recommendations
•Infrastructure and Operations Design Services: create detailed virtualization design and deployment plan
•Services Catalog Development: aligns applications to appropriate service tiers for individual application requirements
Whether considering services assistance or doing it yourself, results and costs will be important.
What about results? What can you reasonably expect?
- Rapid identification of infrastructure cost savings
- Accelerated ROI - less than a year and longer term
- Detailed mapping of business requirements for information type
- Actionable plans so that future growth doesn't erode savings
- Comprehensive, integrated solutions
- Specific solutions combining hardware, software & experience
- Integration of IT applications and infrastructure requirements
- Full interoperability testing for enterprise environments
- Successful IT transformation encompassing virtualization, data center efficiency, and business continuity
You were already busy.
Now there is much more to think about while you avoid the protein-seeking aliens and the pointy-haired boss.
Feel free to share your own alien experiences.
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