IT Infrastructure – So simple I can do this at home...
John Foster, Principal Consultant – C&C Technology Consulting
Most IT operations professionals would say that the breadth and complexity of their organisation’s IT infrastructure has increased significantly in the last decade. However a common attitude among senior IT executives and business leaders is that it should be simple and have a view that what they have built or inherited is just too complex and too costly.
Whilst that view may certainly hold true in many cases, it could be that the consumer IT services coming into the home have got something to do with this? Most IT executives and business leaders are quite comfortable and able to configure their homes with end-to-end high speed wireless connectivity, firewalls protecting their Internet connection, Networked Attached Storage (NAS) systems consolidating their storage (sometimes in the TB’s of data) and then connecting and integrating a range of device from laptops to media centres and mobile phones.
Improvement in the reliability of such technology and the simplicity of the configuration process, not to mention the very low cost, make it seem like this type of technology is a basic commodity and that it should be just as simple and low cost to do this within an organisations IT infrastructure. The truth of course is far from that, but how do you build a case for the value of IT infrastructure?
Well firstly, complexity within IT infrastructure is mainly driven by the services being delivered. Application portfolios supporting the business process and transactions within many large organisations can number in the 100’s if not 1000’s. These applications are the lifeblood of the business but many are aging and have been customised and developed to fit specific requirements. The result of all this is high complexity, high cost and difficulties in carrying out change and improvements in the underlying infrastructure, making it seem too costly and complex.
The reality is that far from being a simple, low cost commodity, infrastructure technology should be seen as a valuable platform that is the enabler for the business to operate effectively. It can improve employee productivity, open up new market and enhance the customer experience when developed and managed effectively.
Of course individual elements of the infrastructure (servers, desktops etc) can be procured as a commodity but the strategy, selection and integration of those elements is far from a commodity and must be aligned to the business services and applications running to realise the real benefit.
So if you want to influence the IT and business leaders in your organisation to understand and invest in the value of IT infrastructure in your organisation and not compare it to what they are running at home you need to:
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Position your critical IT Infrastructure as the business enabling platform that supports the business process and transactions of your organisation
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Identify and target rationalisation of the services you are running across the infrastructure, reduce complexity here and you will massively reduce cost and complexity of the infrastructure
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Select components carefully and manage them as an overall integrated landscape with clear lifecycle management, standards and roadmaps.
